A Town Called Sporks
by Of Glorious Plumage
Summary: Q: What if "Twilight" was rewritten with "Star Trek" characters? A: A lot of improvements. An AU of course. Here there be Kirk/Spock slash and eventual Twilight hating.
1. Preface

Preface

I had never given much thought to the manner of my death – though I had what humans might call a "feeling" that it would involve radiation poisoning – but, even if I had, I would not have expected it to be like this.

Staring across the long room, into the crazed eyes of the hunter, I allowed myself a moment of pride: it was noble to die in the place of my t'hy'la. As the hunter stalked forward to kill me, I heard, as illogical as it may be, echoes of my mother's voice in my head, from when she read aloud to me when I was a child. My thoughts – my feelings – mirrored closely the ending to one of humanity's greatest romances: "It is a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done, a far, far better rest I go to than I have ever known."

* * *

A Few Notes from Of Glorious Plumage: **BalthamosTears** asked for an apocalyptic story, but my muse told me to do this. I'm sorry. Also, this will be long. Maybe. If my attention span lasts.

A Disclaimer from Of Glorious Plumage: I own....nothing. Well, that's actually a lie, because I own my clothes and a computer and some books and a Spock action figure and a Kirk action figure and other non-important things. What I don't own is _Star Trek_. Also, I don't own _Twilight. _Also, I'm not making any money off of this. Does that cover my ass enough that law enforcment officals don't toss me in jail and fine me out of my college savings?


	2. Dramatis Personae

EDIT 1/4/10: Oh Goddess, so I totally did not notice that I didn't have Scotty! How did that happen?!?! **Sir Gawain of Camelot** called me out on it (thank you SOOOOO much, I'd kiss you, but that's kinda awkward over the internet). So it's fixed now.

...Still can't believe I forgot Scotty. I'm going senile and I'm not even close to being old. o.O

* * *

Dramatis Personae

The Star-Cross'd Lovers

Bella Swan…… Spock

Edward Cullen……James T. Kirk

The Cullen Clan……The Illustrious Crew of the U.S.S. _Enterprise_

Carlisle Cullen……Christopher Pike

Esme Cullen……Number One

Rosalie Cullen……Nyota Uhura

Emmett Cullen……Montgomery Scott

Jasper Cullen……Hikaru Sulu

Alice Cullen……Pavel Chekov

The Wolves……The McCoys and the Vulcans

Jacob Black……Leonard "Bones" McCoy

Billy Black……T'Pau

Sam Uley……T'Pring

Leah Clearwater…… Sybok

Seth Clearwater……Joanna McCoy

Embry Call……Stonn

The High Schoolers……Some Other _Enterprise_ Crewmembers Who Fit in Better Here

Jessica…… Janice Rand

Mike Newton……Christine Chapel

Tyler…… Zarabeth of the Fur Bikini

Eric……Leila the Crazy Blonde

Angela……Marlena from the Mirror Universe

Parental Units……Parental Units

Charlie……Amanda Greyson

Renee……Sarek

Volturi……The Admiralty

Aro……Komack

Marcus……Bennett

Caius……Fitzgerald

Antagonists……Antagonists

James……Khan Noonien Singh

Victoria……Marla McGivers

Laurent……Kruge

Also, Maybe Making Important or Not-So-Important Camoes – _Maybe_ – Will Be:

The Horta!

V'Ger!

Sexiness from "Patterns of Force"!

Spock writing angsty poetry!

Doctor Who!

And other such goodness!

* * *

A VERY Important Note:

These characters will be staying true to their _Star Trek_ personalities, rather than those of their _Twilight _counterparts' (though there are some, okay – many, similarities that span both fictional universes). In addition, this will be written by taking _Twilight_, reading it paragraph by paragraph, and rewriting it in Spock's voice.

A VERY **VERY** Important Disclaimer:

The author, Of Glorious Plumage, would like to express that he/she/it owns _none_ of the rights concerning either _Star Trek_ or _Twilight_. Those belong to Paramount and S. Meyer. Furthermore, no money is being made off this work of fan-fiction.


	3. First Sight I

A/N: First part of the first real chapter. Yay. Next one should be coming....soon?

Also, I have a reason for doing making the characters have the roles they do. I also have this whole thing planned out. It's not written down in any form, but it is planned out.

And, I know it doesn't really seem like a Twilight-bashing parody. Yet. It will happen. (Unless something insane happens and I lose control over the story and it goes running off like a wild sehlat and does whatever the hell it wants to do.)

Disclaimer: I neither own anything, nor make money off of it.

* * *

First Sight I

My father declined to accompany me to the transport facility as it would have been irrational to crowd the building with an extraneous person and could have signified an emotional response to my departure. Additionally, it would have been detrimental to my functioning as an independent being on the cusp of adulthood. Therefore, my final hours on Vulcan were experienced with neither parental influence – a state that I knew would change upon my relocation to Terra – nor sentimental emotion.

Standing on the transporter pad, in the moments before I would be beamed up to the passenger ship in orbit, I allowed myself to recall memories associated with my homeworld, but I felt nothing in connection to them: no nostalgia, no happiness, no regret. It would have been an illogical waste of time.

The last memory was this: _"Spock," my father said as I exited our dwelling. I paused, waiting for him to continue, and I had the fleeting, absurd notion that he would embarrass us both with an emotional farewell. Oddly enough, I do not believe I would have minded it. All he said, though, was, "Peace and long life, my son."_

The transporter energized around me, and I refused to be disturbed by the feeling of my body disintegrating.

* * *

In the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington State, a small town called Sporks exists under a continual cover of gaseous, dusty water, or, in human terms, clouds. This town sees approximately eight point four percent more precipitation than any other town or city in United States of America. Inhabited mainly by those higher-ranking Federation officials and their families who did not wish to reside in San Francisco, Sporks was, despite its size, a center for government business.

It was in this town my mother worked and resided, and where my father, Sarek, and I visited when his duties would allow. It was in this town that I would be living, of my own will, for an undetermined length of time.

My choice was a logical one. Personal satsifaction was inconsequential.

* * *

My mother greeted me point-eight-nine seconds after I disembarked off the shuttle at the Port Angeles travel facility – a necessary stop on the way to my destination, as community leaders in Sporks never bothered adapting their town to accomodate the facilities of modern travel. Her exuberant and physical actions, coupled with the lingering disorientation of adjusting to Terra's lighter gravitational pull, evoked a physical sensation I identified as nausea. I could not help but to tense slightly; noticing that, my mother removed her arm from my shoulder with an expression I could not decipher.

The moment passed, and my mother smiled gently at me. "So, how was your trip?" she questioned. "And how's Sarek doing?"

"The transportation was adequate, but I do not understand why you wish to speak of Father. I was under the impression that you and he communicate quite regularly, even more so than you and I do, Mother."

"Like father, like son," she chuckled. "And don't look so puzzled – and yes I can tell what you're thinking, I _am_ your mother. Your father says much the same thing whenever I ask him how you're doing."

I could think of no suitable response to that, so I remained silent as we retrieved my possessions and walked to my mother's car. It was quite distinctive, with the Federation's emblem emblazoned on the side, signifying my mother's position as head of the Cultural Relations Department.

I wished to obtain my own means of transportation so as not to inconvenience my mother, and to gain independence on Terra. I had made plans to buy a vehicle myself, but my mother informed me, as we got into her car, that she was already in possession of one.

"What type of car might it be, mother?" I inquired.

"A truck, actually. A bit old, but…Do you remember T'Pau at L'Psuh?" L'Psuh was a small Vulcan community on the coast, and home to one of the outposts of the Vulcan Science Academy.

"I have heard her name before, but I know no more than that."

"She's a relation of your father's, distantly. She works with the medical department at the Academy there; I think she took on a human student recently, actually. Also, she does some diplomatic things with the Federation. I think she turned down an offer to join the High Council." My mother drove on in silence, apparently having forgotten what linked T'Pau to the truck. After eighty-seven seconds spent in a silence that I must admit could be deemed a "comfortable", I saw no logical reason to refrain from prompting her to speak again.

"What does T'Pau have to do with the vehicle you have, Mother?"

"Oh, that, she doesn't drive much anymore. The other Elders convinced her to get carried around in the traditional litter if she wants to go somewhere, because it is more dignified for one of her age, so she sold me her old truck," my mother smiles at me, and I almost smile back – a habit from my childhood. "I think you'll like it."

"I appreciate your thoughtfulness in -" I begin, but my mother cuts me off.

"I love you, too." She is sincere.

"Love is an emotion. How much do I owe you for the purchase of the truck?"

"One which you feel, even if you persist in denying it. And the truck's my homecoming gift to you, so nothing."

"I can think of no appropriate response."

My mother smiles at me again, but that is all she needs to do. Though she has practiced the teachings of Surak, and can subdue her emotions to the same degree that Vulcans do, my mother is skilled in communicating those emotions without words.


	4. First Sight, II

_A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed, put me on a favourites list, or just lurked around in the shadows. I still owe **Sir Gawain** for catching my Scotty-exclusion mistake. Anyways, all of you, feel free to PM me if you have a question or concern about this thing. _

_I disclaim that I own no rights at all connected to Star Trek or Twilight._

* * *

First Sight, II

* * *

The environment surrounding Sporks was aesthetically pleasing, if you enjoyed the color green. Everything was some shade of that hue: the flora, the light filtering through the leaves of the tall trees, the covering of moss and ferns on the ground. It was not a new sight to me as I had visited my mother before, but this time it appeared slightly different, as if I were seeing it from a different perspective – a perspective that included the place being my home, rather than just a place I spent my vacations.

I told my mother of this change in perception. She said that that's how humans think.

Upon a secondary contemplation, I decided that nothing looked different. Or felt different. That would be illogical.

* * *

Poised at the edge of a damp forest, my mother's house appeared small in comparison to the trees behind it. In the street in front of the house, was the – my – truck. It was painted a faded shade of red reminiscent of Vulcan's sands. With a body frame made entirely of a refined iron-chromium alloy, it was the closest a mere truck could come to being invulnerable. It also had wheels, which were rarely seen outside of museums due to the fact that most forms of transport evolved to rely on hover-lift propulsion systems, and a considerable amount (47.6%, to be exact) of travel on Terra was air- or transporter- based.

My mother informed me that, while the outside of the vehicle looked "like something out of a historical holo-vid", the engine had been converted to a modern, and expensive, electromagnetic-coil system by T'Pau a year before. The electromagnetic-coils, an invention of students from the Vulcan Science Academy, generated power when connected to a cationic energy current and produced such a current when generating power – making my truck a perpetual motion machine.

* * *

I needed only one trip to move all my possessions to my room, one of the two in my mother's house. When the cloud-cover lifted, large windows on the southern walls allowed natural light to permeate the rectangular (an unobservant person would think it square, but the lengths of the north and south walls were five-point-six centimeters longer than those of the east and west walls) room, brightening the beige walls and golden wood floors. An old-fashioned desk sat in the corner, with a computer and four PADDs for my use on top of it.

There were two toilets in the house, but only one full bathroom, which I would share with my mother. I knew it was necessary, and that both of us would respect the other's privacy, but a part of me (the human part, I surmised – and it was not annoying, nor did it bother me overmuch, nor did I dwell on the comments my Vulcan peers had made about that half of my genetic components) was slightly distressed by the prospect.

One of the most comforting things about my mother was also one of the most objectionable: she hovered. Silently she remained with me, a warm shadow at the corner of my eyes, and smiling gently as she aided me in unpacking. I appreciated her unconditional love for me and her gentle presence, but the tickles of emotions against my mind were unfamiliar and, as such, discomfiting.

Unusual as it was, I can admit – in the privacy of my own mind, though even the teaching of Surak state that there is nothing at all wrong with being close to family members– that I enjoyed my mother's company. Indeed, I would have found my stay on Terra quite pleasant were it not for one thing: school.

* * *

Sporks High School was attended by three hundred and fifty-eight students, including myself. Most of the students had grown up together, which would make me seem like an oddity even more than I already was – not that I cared what others thought of me. However, like most of them, I had family members connected to the Federation.

Sporks was a government town and second, on Terra, in importance to San Francisco, but virtually unknown in comparison to the many times larger and many times more legendary seat of power. Important work was done in Sporks, and many dignitaries chose to make it their second home due to its quiet quaintness. Their children attended Sporks High, along with everyone else's children. Aside from the branch of the Vulcan Science Academy in L'Psuh, which was extremely selective and existed mainly for Vulcan visitors rather than for anyone in Sporks (though, according to my mother, there was at least one human student there, studying advanced xenobiology and medicine), it was the only institute of secondary education in the area.

I would have preferred to attend the Academy, but my basic schooling was not yet complete: I had not yet graduated from the Vulcan equivalent of high school, and so would have to attend Sporks High. Fortunately, it was one of the highest ranked public high schools on Terra as most of the instructors were retired Federation professionals or Starfleet officers, the majority of the students tested far above average on aptitude and standardized tests, and the curriculum was advanced to such a point that it was almost comparable to a Vulcan school.

I was not worried about the quality of my education, but I did have apprehensions – no, not apprehensions, but very slight concerns – about the ease with which I would segue into the school. No, that was not correct either. Let me say instead that I recognized that, due to my status as "the new kid" and my distinctive Vulcan heritage, there was the potential to experience a few difficulties due to illogical humans that would impede my smooth transition into a new habitat and could be detrimental to my as yet unperfected emotional control.

Perhaps, it would be easier if I looked less like a Vulcan, less…different from humans.

* * *

I was ivory-skinned, pallid, tinted green where my skin was translucent enough to let the color of my copper-based blood show through. My oil-black hair contrasted sharply to that lightness. While my coloring would not be quite enough to set me too visibly apart from humans, other aspects of my physiology were.

My eyebrows, swept up at an angle unachieved by any human without artificial aid, were obvious due to my traditional hair style: short, with straight, blunt bangs. My ears were also uncovered; Vulcans have been called elves by humans before, and the reason for that lies mainly with the ears.

Furthermore, my telepathic abilities would make it difficult to be around tactile, emotional humans who do not understand discretion, much less the concept of personal space. I would have to be careful to maintain a physical distance from others, which would, of course, set me even further apart.

* * *

I was illogical and overly emotional.

The opinions of others in regards to my appearance and ethnicity do not matter.

* * *

_Thank you for reading. There **should** be some Kirk/Spcok interaction next chapter, but I don't know when I'll be able to finish editing it and upload it. School life eats away at my internet life, and both of those are less important to me than my real life._

_Plumage out._


	5. First Sight, III

_A/N: A big thank you to everyone who reviewed, even if you don't have an account for me to reply to. Just wanted to say, the spray-on carpet stuff? ( I marked the mention of it with an astrisk*.) Totally stole that from William Shatner's book _Collision Course _which, while not actually canon, is still freaking awesome. _

First Sight, III

Oddly, almost disturbingly, I was unable to achieve a restful state of meditation the night before my first day of attending Sporks High School. Due perhaps to my extremely acute sense of hearing, I was continually distracted by the patter of rain on the roof and the rustling of wind in the trees. Submitting to a childish whim, I pulled a blanket off the bed and over my head. But I could not rest until three-twenty-one in the morning, when the rain finally settled into a quieter drizzle.

Thick fog obscured my view when I gazed out the window in the morning, and I could feel the physical sensations commonly associated with claustrophobia: unlike on Vulcan, where the atmosphere was clear of precipitation ninety-eight percent of the time, I could not see the sky in Sporks.

Though I did not need to follow the same nutritional rituals as my fully human mother, she still insisted that I breakfast with her. She wished me luck and ignored me when I tried to tell her that not only was the concept of luck an illogical superstition but that, even if it were real, I would not acquire it simply because someone else should wish it. After my mother left for work, I examined the details of the house. The kitchen was small, but had been painted light, bright colors in an attempt to make it appear open and large. Over the fireplace in the adjoining living room was an orderly row of holo-pics, chronologically showing the development of our family. First a picture of my parents on the day of their bonding, right before my great-grandfather, as patriarch of the clan, linked their minds according to ancient ritual. The last one was of myself, a recent school mandated photograph that was put on my official student identification card. Vulcans do not feel embarrassment, but I almost did whenever I saw that particular image: it was taken just as an unidentified irritant in the air wafted up my nasal passage and into my sinuses, provoking the explosive reaction known as a sneeze. School officials told me that "picture retakes" would be an illogical waste of time. I suspect that they were base enough to be amused at my ill-timed sneeze. My father must have given it to my mother against my direct wishes.

* * *

I did not wish to be too early to school, but neither did see any purpose to lingering in the house. I donned a wind-resistant, water-proof jacked – something I had never needed on Vulcan – and ventured out.

It was drizzling, not enough to seriously saturate me, but enough to be vaguely uncomfortable, as I locked the front door and made my way to my truck. The sloshing of my boots was unnerving, as accustomed as I was to the dry crunch of sand and gravel under my feet, but I ignored it. I hurried to get to inside the truck and out of the mist that swirled under my hood and clung to my face and hair, undoubtedly causing my immaculately arranged hair to become disarrayed.

Once inside the truck, I noted how the upholstery smelt of faintly Vulcan incense, engine oil, and peppermint. That mixture of scents led me to form a mental picture of T'Pau, the truck's former owner and presumably the one who introduced those smells to the truck, that consisted of an elderly matriarch dressed stubbornly in untraditional 'mint green', meditating in the driver's seat with the incense smoldering beside her after working on the engine herself because she was possessive and proud and so would not allow anyone else to do so. But I quickly banished that vision from my mind: no Vulcan is so eccentric, especially not a dignified elder.

* * *

Finding the school was not hard, though I had never been there before. It looked like a collection of matching brick houses, its grounds liberally populated with many trees and shrubs. I parked in front of the first building, which had a small sign over the front door which read FRONT OFFICE. No one else had parked there, which made me think it was off limits, but I decided to get directions instead of circling around. I did not quite run from my truck to the building, but I did try to minimize the time I spent in the cold and wet. Not because I felt any feelings of dislike, of course, but it would be irrational to get too wet and risk falling ill.

The office was warm and brightly lit, though small and slightly shabby: a little waiting area with padded folding chairs, beige spray-on carpet pattern*, notices covering an old-fashioned bulletin board, fake ferns, and a main desk covered with a substance that I identified as plastic made to look like wood with the addition of a "wood grain" pattern. The large, red-haired woman behind the desk looked up at my arrival. "Can I help you?"

"I am S'chn T'gai Spock," I informed her, and saw the immediate awareness light her eyes. I was expected, but that was not surprise. The half-Vulcan son of Lady Amanda Grayson enrolled in the local public high school must have been, understandably, a major topic of gossip.

"Of course," she said, digging through a precariously tilting stack of PADDs on her desk till she found the one she was looking for. "I have your schedule right here, and a map of the school." She proceeded to show me the best route to each class (apparently, Terrans preferred to have their children in a more social setting, with more interactions between teachers and students, then Vulcans did, who believed that teaching pods did a more than adequate job), and gave me a slip of paper for each of my teachers to sign, which I was to return at the end of the day.

* * *

When I went back out to my truck, other students were starting to arrive so I followed the line of vehicles to the appropriate parking area. Most of the vehicles were mundane cars, a bit out of date; the newest and nicest car was gleaming and streamlined and had a quadruple-hoverpad chassis. It would be an understatement to say that it stuck out.

I looked at the map in the truck, memorizing it quickly, before stuffing everything I needed in my school bag and exiting the cab of the truck.

I kept my face pulled back into my hood as I walked to the crowded area outside the cafeteria. Building Gamma, the site of my first class, was just beyond.

As I entered the small classroom, I noticed that the people ahead of me paused just inside the door to hang up their coats. More than willing to divest myself of the now dripping garment, I did the same before taking my slip to the teacher, a tall and balding human who was identified on my schedule as Mr. Manson. He gawked at me – not, perhaps, the response I was looking for – before sending me to an empty desk at the back of the room.

I would have assumed that most students, though generally lacking the discipline and discretion of a Vulcan due to their human nature, would not be so rude as to turn around in their desks to stare at a new student in the back of the room and fail to respect their teacher. My assumption was wrong. They stared.

* * *

When the bell rang with a harsh sound that grated painfully on my sensitive ears, a slender Terran girl with blonde hair leaned across the aisle to talk to me.

"You're Spock Grayson, aren't you?" She appeared over-exuberant and, though I did not exercise my telepathic talents to investigate further, had a psyche that was tainted with mental imbalance.

"Spock," I corrected, deciding to give out the part of my full name they could pronounce, rather than having to hear all of it mangled through human vocal cords. Everyone within a three-seat radius turned to look at me.

"What's your next class?" she asked.

"My second class is Advanced Governments with Ms. Jefferson in building six." There was nowhere to look that would avoid curious eyes.

"I'm headed to building four, I could show you the way….I'm Leila, by the way."

I refrained from telling her that I had a photographic memory and had already memorized the map. That would have been rude. Instead I said politely, "I appreciate your kindness, but I-"

"Oh, no – it's quite alright. Not a problem for me. But we should get going before we're late," she cut me off, before proceeding to grab my arm and haul me out the door. The physical contact was distasteful.

* * *

Leila and I engaged in conversation as we walked. She to simply fill the air with sound waves, and me to be polite.

"So, this is a lot different from Vulcan, huh?" she asked.

"Indeed."

"It doesn't rain much there, does it?"

"Indeed."

"Wow, what must that be like?" she wondered.

"Inde – Sunny."

"You don't look very tan."

For a nanosecond I considered explaining in depth how Vulcan skin, particularly the melanin, was different from that of humans and how our star did not produce the same ultra-violet light as Sol did. But I had no wish to talk to Leila for that long. And my mother said that the typical Terran loves humor. So I said: "My father was partially albino. I inherited it."

She studied my expressionless face apprehensively. It appeared as if my attempt of a joke "flew over her head". By that time we had reached my destination, and I managed to escape.

* * *

After Advanced Government, I had Astrophysics. My instructor for that class, Mr. Varner, made me introduce myself to the class. I will not recount that horror.

* * *

After two more classes, I started to recognize faces in each class. There were a few who spoke to me, asked me how I like Sporks. I tried to be diplomatic in my responses.

One girl, Janice Rand, who sat next to me in both Astrophysics and Latin, walked with me to the cafeteria for lunch. She was petite, but her immense, woven hairstyle added nine point eight inches to her height. She, like Leila, talked unnecessarily.

We sat at the end of a full table with several of her friends, who she introduced to me as Christine Chapel, Zarabeth, and Marlena. The seemed impressed by her bravery in speaking to me. Leila waved at me from across the room.

It was there, sitting in the lunchroom, trying to be social, that I first saw them.

They were sitting in the corner of the cafeteria that was the farthest away from my seat. There were five of them and they seemed separate from the other students for some reason. They were quite, contained, intensely involved with themselves. For a moment, they sparkled in a rare beam of sunlight – I closed my eyes briefly to dispel that absurd vision.

There were four boys – one slightly stocky, with straight brown hair. Another was taller and leaner, with physical characteristics indicating Asian heritage. The third had a boyish face, and his hair was a bit of a lighter brown than the firsts'. The last was broad-shouldered and well muscled, with golden hair. The one female of the group was of African origin, statuesque, and immensely dignified.

They were some of the most aesthetically pleasing humans I had seen at the school.

"Who might those students be?" I asked Janice.

As she looked up to see who I meant, the golden male looked across the room, straight at her, at us, at me. I did not look away, and he dropped his gaze, but only after scrutinizing my face and what he could see of my body.

Janice made a sound I must classify as a giggle. "The girl is Nyota Uhura, but everyone calls her Uhura. She's dating the brown-haired guy, Montgomery Scott, but I've only ever heard him called Scotty. He's Scottish. The Asian is Hikaru Sulu, and the kid is Pavel Chekov – everyone thinks they're together."

"And the last?" I inquired.

"James Kirk," she sighed. "They all live with Christopher Pike and his XO."

I think I know the name, but I ask to make sure. "Is this the same Christopher Pike that was captain of the starship _Enterprise_?"

"Yup, he retired here after he got hurt on a mission, and now he watches over those five because their parents are busy or dead."

The conversation died for a moment, but it is not long before Rand revived it. "Kirk is just so hot, isn't he?"

I did not respond.

"He flirts, like, _all_ the time – with _everyone_ – but I haven't met anyone who can _prove_ they've been out with him. But we can dream, right?"

At that moment, James Kirk looked at me and smiles in a way I cannot classify as predatory, sated, challenging, or amused. Or a mixture of all of those things and more.


	6. First Sight, IV

_Disclaimer: I own none of this. _

* * *

First Sight, IV

Though I had previously passed a similar class on Vulcan, I was required to attend Advanced Xenobiology in the period following lunch. Upon entering the classroom, I observed that the only empty seat was beside the male with the golden hair – James Kirk. As I walked down the aisle beside him to introduce myself to the teacher and get the required signature, Kirk straightened in his seat. I assumed his interest in me was based on my status of newcomer. I did not bother to verify my assumption by looking at his face to decipher any emotion he might have shown.

The instructor, a Dr. John Smith, signed my slip and gave me a textbook (which was decidedly…odd…considering that most forms of textual information had long since been converted to digital media and were displayed on PADDs. But, taking into account the many varied idiosyncrasies of human nature and the fact that Dr. Smith happened to be wearing an old-fashioned suit with scuffed laced-up rubber-soled shoes, perhaps the book was not so strange). I then took my seat, next to James Kirk, ignoring the sidelong look he was directing at me.

I did not glance up as I set my book on the table and took my seat. In the corner of my eye, I saw Kirk's posture change: somehow he managed to convey an attitude of alertness while managing to lounge casually against the seatback.

The lesson, on shifts in cellular anatomy throughout the early evolutionary periods of the major humanoid races, was surprisingly not tedious. Though I had already covered the subject while on Vulcan, Dr. Smith's style of presentation was eccentric, energetic, meandering, and sprinkled through with information I had never learned before. However, while it did hold my attention, the lecture was not quite captivating enough to distract me from the young man who sat beside me.

James Kirk would not cease to direct his line of sight towards me.

And, on the single occasion I turned my head to meet his stare with one of my own, he simply smiled widely, and winked one hazel eye. The tips of my ears grew heated from a sudden rush of blood.

Dr. Smith noticed our inattentiveness and threw a pencil (my mind proceeded down a tangent: who had a pencil? Did they not die out with the close of the twenty-second century?) at Kirk.

"Mr. Kirk! It's just a tiny bit rude to stare at people, by the way. In case your parental figure never told you that."

I snapped my gaze back front. I did not look to see if Kirk did the same.

* * *

When the bell rang to dismiss us from class, Kirk turned towards me in his seat and moved my chair with his feet so I was likewise turned towards him.

"Hey," his smile was beyond classification, "I know you're new, so I was wondering if you wanted a tour or something around town. There's not much, but you should know where you're living, right? I wouldn't mind showing you around."

I was not tempted by his offer, nor by anything…else…that I saw. (Not that I saw anything. I was not staring at Kirk. Visual appeal did not interest me, so, therefore, I had no reason to stare at Kirk. Beyond a cursory glance. Which was not, I told myself, staring.)

"Thank you, but that will not be necessary," I informed him. "If you will excuse me, I must depart so as to be able to attend my next class in a punctual manner."

I supported my words with physical actions and left the room.

* * *

"Hey, Spock!" a female voice exclaimed. I turned around to see Christine Chapel, one of the students that I had sat with at lunch and who I also had Xenobiology with, her light blonde hair falling into disarray as she ran to my side. "Do you need any help finding you next class?"

"Negative."

"Oh." Her countenance fit an adjective I heard my mother use: crestfallen.

"If your next class is near the same vicinity as mine, I would not object to your company as we walk," I did-not-blurt out. "I am headed to the gymnasium."

"I have gym next, too!" Christine smiled again.

Christine spoke very little as we walked, making me reevaluate my opinion that teenaged human females enjoyed the sound of their voice to the point of incessant chatter. Apparently, not all teenaged human females were like Janice Rand.

But as we drew near the gym, she spoke up: "So, I noticed Jim Kirk deflated his ego enough to talk to you and offer to give up time to show you around. You should probably know that Janice will be pissed at you for that. She's obsessed with the guy."

"I believe I might have noticed at lunch that she admired him, but I do not comprehend how the depth of her infatuation can negatively affect me. Kirk initiated conversation, and I declined his offer." I avoided any remarks that might have been seen as unkind about obsession being an indication of severe mental instability. Also, it was possible Christine was exaggerating.

"But she'll be angry because she does everything she can to get him to notice her - and then you come into class, and he stares at you the whole time. She gets envious." She shrugged. "Probably, she'll spread nasty rumors about you behind your back."

"Words are incapable of causing harm."

Christine made a little snorting sound. "Physically maybe not, but emotionally?"

"Vulcans have no emotions."

"Anyways. I'm not surprised Kirk talked to you, I would have done the same." As she smiled at me, she experienced muscular convulsions in her eyelids.

"Christine, are you entering into a seizure? Your eyes are twitching at an abnormal rate. Is there any medication you need?"

Immediately, the movement stopped.

* * *

My first day attending a Terran school was an unusual experience. I tried to list all the ways in which it differed from the school I attended on Vulcan, information I had previously gained, and my own expectations. However, my mind kept reverting to the memory of a pair of warm hazel eyes, one of them closing in a wink.

* * *

_A/N: Wow. So, finally at the end of the first chapter of "Twilight". It pains me to have to read it again, but I get to write K/S slash from it, so....maybe balances out? Anyways, now that I have all the expostition done, I can probaby pick up the pacing of the plot (because I have been informed that it drags a bit and all you lovely readers will get bored after a while)._

_I would like to take a moment to thank everyone who has left a review. And another moment to thank everyone who subscribed/favourited - even if you didn't leave a review. And a third and final moment to everyone who has taken the time to read up to this point. Yay._

_I'll try to have an update by Monday night (PST). I think I can manage that._

_Live long and prosper,  
~Plumage_


	7. Open Book, I

_A/N: It's monday evening! Yay! I did it!_

_Disclaimer: Really, if I owned anything, this would not be FANfiction._

* * *

Open Book, I

The next day had few deviances from the first. In some ways, it was a more preferable day. (If I preferred some days over others. Which I did not.) In other ways, it was not.

It was not raining in the morning, which was an appreciated quirk of the weather. I knew what to expect from my classes. The females I met the previous day remained cordial and helpful: most of them contrived to sit next to me in my classes, and I ate lunch with a group that included Christine, Janice, Leila, and their various friends. I was introduced to the quiet Marlena, Gary Mitchell (who was a close friend of James Kirk's, Janice informed me), a young woman called Zarabeth who was wearing a fur bikini (it violated school dress codes, but I never saw her get in trouble for it), and the burly Giotto who preferred to be addressed by his surname and had a penchant for wearing red shirts.

On the other hand, I was physically suffering from mild sleep deprivation: I did not achieve the rest I required with the wind continuing to howl around the house, even after the rain stopped. Additionally, I was forced to play a human game called "football" in Physical Education. While I would normally find human games undemanding and even enjoyable due to my advantages in strength and coordination over humans, football required excessive contact with the other players. If I am to express the situation with human humor, I would say "touch telepathy plus a lot of touching plus trying to block it equals bad headache".

One thing that was neither good nor bad: James Kirk was absent.

I stopped myself from wondering why. It was none of my business, and furthermore I had no logical reason to dwell on the attendance of that particular member of my peer group. Other people were absent too, and I was not thinking about them, so I should not have been thinking about Kirk.

* * *

The first night I had spent at my mother's house, I realized that she eschewed replicated food (I found a space in the kitchen wall where I assumed the replicator once was, but it appeared as if my mother had forcibly removed it), and preferred to order in food rather than cook because her work schedule left no time for meal preparation. It was not her fault, but all of the food consisted of unhealthy substances, even if my mother's adherence to the Vulcan principals of vegetarianism meant that meat products were avoided. So I insisted that I cook all meals for the duration of my stay. My mother agreed.

I visited the nearest grocery store immediately after the conclusion of my second day of school; the layout of the store followed a logical pattern, thankfully, and I was able to quickly find what I needed. The shopping was a familiar task: my father and I took turns making meals and buying the food we needed when we chose not to replicate anything, so I had adequate practice in feeding two people.

After I got home and unloaded the groceries, I prepared a pasta casserole and put it in the antiquated oven to bake while I completed my homework.

While eating dinner my mother asked how school was progressing..

"I have been accepted by a group, comprised mainly of females," I told her, "They insist that I sit with them during the lunch break. Everyone is extremely…amiable."

"So, very different from Vulcan."

"Indeed."

"Do you prefer it here?"

"I do not have preferences."

"Spock, humor me."

"…It is too early to make a definitive decision on the matter, Mother."

We ate in silence for another three minutes and fifty one seconds. Illogically, I then found myself asking about Christopher Pike and the group living with him. The question left my mouth as though it had free will.

"Captain Pike?" She clarified. "Well, former captain now, I guess. Chris was captain of the starship _Enterprise_, but got into some trouble exploring some world. He's in pretty bad shape, physically, so he retired here to do some bureaucratic work for Starfleet. His XO came with him so she could take care of him, and they take in anyone who wants to live and go to school in Sporks and whose parents are busy off-world in Starfleet. From what I've heard, they're a great group of kids. Why do you ask?"

"I heard people mention them at school. …You appear to be done with your food; do you wish for me to clear your plate and cutlery from the table?"

"Sure, but that was a very obvious way to change the subject, sweetie, you need to work on your subtlety a bit. Your father could help you, I think."

* * *

The third day at school was a Friday. I was still tired. I still had to play football. My new acquaintances were excited for the weekend, and their plans for an upcoming trip to the beach at the L'Psuh Ocean Park. I was invited, and had agreed to go more out of politeness and an inclination to have contact with the Vulcans af L'Psuh than anything else.

My first weekend in Sporks passed without incident. My mother spent most of her time working. I took the opportunity to rearrange everything in the house so all objects were located in more logical places depending on their purpose and the frequency we used them. I thought about contacting my father, but I saw no real reason to do so: he already knew I was safely with my mother, and there was nothing imperative I had to tell him.

The wind was calm, and the rains stayed soft, so I was able to rest and meditate successfully.

* * *

Monday morning was cold and while it was not raining, the cloud cover was darkly thick. Christine sat by me during our first class, and mentioned that the meteorologists were expecting snow. I knew that snow was frozen precipitation, but I had never experienced it. It did not sound pleasant.

When Christine and I exited the classroom, the air was full of swirling bits of white. I could hear people shouting to their friends in excitement. The wind felt viciously cold on the skin of my nose, ears, and fingers. I quickly stuffed my sensitive fingers in my pockets.

"Wow," Christine laughed. "It's snowing!"

The cold white fluff stung when it hit my exposed skin, so cold it felt as if it were burning. I could feel my external temperature drop dangerously and my internal organs slowed down in an attempt to conserve heat. My body, operating at a temperature far higher than that of a human's, was suffering in the freezing weather. I began walk briskly towards my next class.

Christine, surprised, caught up with me. "Don't you like snow?"

"Negative. Too cold."

"Too...? Oh! That's right! Vulcan body temperature is higher, so you have less tolerance for the cold. This must be horrible for you." Just then, a large ball of dripping snow smacked into the back of Christine's head. She turned to see where it came from, and I spared a glance behind me. I suspected the culprit was Leila, who was walking quickly away – in the wrong direction for her next class. Christine apparently thought the same. She bent over and began scraping together a pile of snow.

"I shall see you at lunch," I said, and continued on. I had no wish to remain in the cold, or to be caught in the crossfire of thrown snow.

* * *

Throughout the morning, everyone talked excitedly about the snow. I declined to comment.

Walking to lunch with Janice, I kept a large PADD in my hand, disregarding the fact that electronics usually malfunction after exposure to moisture, ready to use it as a shield against the snowballs that flew through the air. She was greatly amused by my caution, but kindly refrained from throwing any snow at me.

Christine caught up to us as we entered the cafeteria, laughing, her hair damp with melting ice. She and Janice animatedly discussed the snow as we got in line to purchase food. I glanced around the large, noisy room, curious about the number of people who had actively participated in the 'snowball fights'. My gaze fell onto a golden head, and then traveled downwards slightly to look at the face beneath that distinctive hair.

James Kirk was back at school.

Janice noticed who I was looking at. "Look! Jim's back!" Her voice was high, squealing. Christine rolled her eyes at me.

I proceeded to buy my lunch.


	8. Open Book, II

_A/N: This short little thing takes us to the end of chapter two of "Twilight". I also need to say, please don't expect any more really quick updates like this - this was a procrastination tactic (An AP English essay? One that I'm supposed to be working on because it's due soon and worth major points? What essay? I'm writing fanfic.) , and my life will be getting more and more hectic as I prepare for Finals and other Big Badass Tests._

_On a whole different note, I was rereading some of the previous stuff, and I realized that I made some pretty bad errors (you know, grammer and style and tense and and continuity, all that stuff that I really should know by now). I have no excuse for my mistakes. I'm sorry. I probably won't go back to fix the early stuff (I'm a very lazy person), but I will try my hardest to do better for the rest of this project._

_Before the A/N gets longer than the actual chapter: Big, big, BIG thank you to everyone who's reading this and an even bigger one to the people who reviewed and favorited. I would mention you all by name, but that would take too long!_

_And have I mentioned that I own none of this except the idea? Twilight ain't mine (not that I would want it), Star Trek ain't mine (now this, this I want)._

* * *

Open Book, II

When I arrived at Advanced Xenobiology, a few minutes late because I slipped on a patch of ice and spilled all of my belongings, Dr. Smith was distributing microscopes, tricorders, and slides to each table and my table partner – James Kirk – was already seated.

"Hey," he said as I sat down. "I'm afraid I might have seemed a bit over-exuberant last week. So, uh, I'm sorry?" He smiled brightly.

"There is no need for you to apologize, but I appreciate the sentiment." It was what my mother had told me to tell people instead of lecturing them about the illogicality and uselessness of apologies.

I suspected that Kirk might have tried to continue the conversation, but Dr. Smith began to explain the lab we would be doing: analyzing the samples on the slides through a microscope and checking the accuracy of our observations with a tricorder.

"You wanna go first, Spock?" Kirk asked, pushing the microscope towards me.

"I have no preference on the order in which we take turns to view the slides."

"Ooookay. You go first."

It took me longer to adjust the microscope than it did to assess the slide. "Prophase in the meiosis cycle of a cell from the Orion Butterfly."

"Do you mind if I look?" he asked as I began to remove the slide. His hand caught mine. I twitched as if an electric current ran up my arm at his touch: it was more than what I would normally experience through my touch telepathy. Perhaps Kirk's Psi/ESPer ratings were higher than those of the average human. I would find an opportunity to ask.

"I'm sorry," he muttered and gave me an odd look as he pulled the microscope towards him, "Forgot that Vulcans don't like to touch." He looked through the lens and confirmed my identification before moving on to the second slide: "Sample of the Andorian Shingles virus."

"If I may?" I asked.

He smirked and pushed the microscope to me.

He was correct.

Working together, we finished with the microscope and checked our work with the tricorder before the other groups had gotten halfway through with their slides. Dr. Smith collected our materials.

Which left me with nothing to do other than to avoid the stare Kirk was now directing at me. I do not believe it was a malicious stare; it seemed as if he were trying to figure something out about me.

"It's too bad about the snow, isn't it? It's starting to melt," he said suddenly.

"No," I answered honestly.

"You don't like the cold. Or the wet." It wasn't a question.

"I do not like or dislike."

"Sporks must be a difficult place for you to live," he mused.

"There is no hardship in my residency."

He chuckled. "Not quite what I meant. So…what are you doing here if you don't like the weather?"

"I do not dislike the -"

"Yeah, I get it. Why are you here? Or even, why aren't you in L'Psuh if you have to be on Earth?" His questions had no obvious taints of animosity.

I debated how I would phrase my answer. "My parents' work keeps them separate, though they would rather be together as a bonded couple should be. I visited my mother here in Sporks for short periods of time, but resided on Vulcan with my father. The nature of my father's ambassadorial work has changed recently, so I chose to live with my mother for an extended period of time and attend school here rather than travel with my father and sacrifice aspects of my education. I cannot attend the Academy at L'Psuh until I graduate high school."

"So here you are."

"Obviously. I fail to understand why you would state a fact such as that when you can see me sitting at this precise location."

He started to laugh, "Okay, so they don't call me 'Captain Obvious' without reason."

I do not believe I shall ever understand human concepts of humor.


	9. Phenomenon, I

_A/N: Okay, so when I said that there would be no more sudden updates last chapter, I spoke too soon. I was procrasintating on some Important Shit, and I was getting all stressed out because I wasn't sure how to do this chapter (Edward saves Bella with his vampire-ness, but Kirk isn't a vampire, so...), and then Sublime Inspiration whacked me over the head with a pillowcase full of ballpoint pens and tiny elephants and told me to write this. So I did. _

_Now, and I am serious this time, I probably won't be able to update until Saturday evening. Damn SATs are overtaking my life._

_Disclaimer: Do I still need to tell you this? I own no copyrights, I make no money._

* * *

Phenomenon, I

When my consciousness shifted from a dormant sleep-state to full awareness in the morning, I immediately noticed a change in my immediate surroundings.

It was light.

There was not much of the natural illumination – far less than I was accustomed to on Vulcan, but atypical of Sporks. The windows were free of their veil of fog, allowing the harsh winter sun to gleam through. I hastened to look outside.

Though it was bright, a fine layer of snow dusted the horizontal surfaces of everything I could see. Moreover, all the rain and melted snow from the previous day had frozen solid, encasing the foliage of the evergreens in brilliant sheaths of ice and making the driveway and roads slickly dangerous.

I should have known: the lack of cloud cover let the sun's rays pierce farther towards the earth, but also allowed the escape of warmer air into the highest reaches of the atmosphere.

* * *

My mother had departed for work before I got downstairs, so I ate my morning meal in solitude, distracted only by the impending challenge of driving to school; while I appreciated my truck and its unique, outdated wheels, those wheels would be difficult to control on icy roads.

It took immense concentration to walk down the driveway: I had no previous experience with ice, and had to be careful to keep my footing, lest a misplaced step cause a painful accident. The multiple layers of insulating garments I had attired myself with did nothing to help matters any. I almost lost my balance when I finally reached the truck, but I managed, by means of flailing my arms wildly, to cling to the side mirror and save myself.

The truck performed excellently on the black ice that covered the roads. I drove cautiously and slowly, though, not wanting to lose control and carve a path of destruction through Sporks that would have surely ended in my demise.

Exiting the truck as school, I saw why I had had so little trouble: there were thin chains crisscrossed in diamond shapes around all the tires. My mother must have gotten up extremely early to put the chains on my truck so I could drive safely. Suddenly, embarrassingly, I felt tightness in my heart. I put my hand over it, categorizing the emotion I could not deny feeling. It was surprise, gratitude, love – all for my mother's kind gesture.

I was standing by the back corner of the truck, hand over the area of my abdomen that housed my heart, fighting back the wave of appalling emotion, when I heard an odd sound.

It was a high-pitched screech, and it was painfully loud.

I looked up, startled.

Simultaneously, I observed several things. Nothing was moving slower than normal, but the rush of adrenaline in my body made my brain process information much quicker than average, and I was able to absorb several things in clear detail.

James Kirk stood across the parking lot aisle, his face a mask of shock. A dark blue van was veering quickly towards me, a layer of ice covering its frontal guidance mechanism and its front right hoverpad, destroying the driver's ability to turn the vehicle. The angle at which it was traveling meant it would crash into me, and pin me to the corner of my truck. The speed at which it traveled gave me no time to move away from it. The force behind it would crush me almost instantly, shattering the majority of my skeletal structure and irreparably damaging my internal organs.

Suddenly something smashed into my face, causing me to fall to the ground and crack my head against the pavement.

The airborne van careened into the back of my truck, ricocheted off of it, and crunched into the rear of the car to the left of my truck before settling to a stop a mere eleven centimeters from my sprawled legs.

It was nearly silent for one point nine seconds, only the wind through the trees and the creaking of damaged metal causing any reverberations in the air, before the screaming began. In the bedlam, I could hear more than one person shouting my name. But out of all the yelling voices, I could hear James Kirk's the best as he clambered through the wreckage to my side.

Abruptly, I realized what it was that had saved my life.

It was a backpack.

In my not-panic (for a Vulcan would never panic, even when faced with certain death), I had only thought in the horizontal direction when I realized that I would not be able to escape, and had accidentally disregarded the fact that by dropping to the ground (or, perhaps, leaping vertically into the air) I would have had a chance, a miniscule chance (if the van had swung the other way in the crash, or had not hit my truck hard enough to bounce away from it…), of avoiding death. The backpack, thrown with amazing precision, impacted against me hard enough to knock me down and was hurled forcefully enough that it reached me before the van could.

"Spock? Are you all right?" Kirk had reached my side.

"I am adequate." _I think._ My voice sounded calm, unruffled, unemotional. As if near-death experiences were common in my life.

"Ummm…Your face is bleeding. Like lots. From where the backpack hit. Sorry 'bout that, by the way, but -"

"You were the one who threw the pack?" I queried.

"Ah," he seemed bashful. "I did, yeah. I didn't really think…."

"On the contrary, it showed admirable qualities of instantaneous decision making as well as astounding calculations of projectiles and physical strength. And I believe I owe you thanks for saving my life."

For some incomprehensible reason, his face reddened at my words, and he fidgeted nervously with the strap of the backpack. "Not at all," he mumbled, "But I just didn't want to, I mean, that if you – well, it was just…." He trailed off, but continued in a much more confident, bold tone. "Don't thank me yet, I think you hit your head pretty hard against the ground" – which was true, I discovered as I attempted to sit up – "and your face is still bleeding. I think most of it is from your nose. Um, it's kinda really weird because it's so…_green_."

"Vulcan blood is copper based, so oxidation causes green pigmentation. Should you not have already covered that in Xenobiology?"

He nodded in affirmative, but declined to comment further. We watched in silence as the driver of the van – Zarabeth, her fur bikini slightly askew in a direction that revealed far more of the female body than I had ever seen outside of educational material – was pulled from the wreckage. She tried to apologize to me the whole time, sobbing that she hadn't noticed her control over her vehicle was compromised since the route from her house to Sporks High was a mostly straight line.

As an ambulance arrived to take Zarabeth and I to the hospital, so we could be examined for any serious injury, I could not help but to ask Kirk, "Earlier, before you commented on the oddity of my blood, you had difficulty in completing what you tried to say. I believe the exact words were 'but I just didn't want to, I mean, that if you – well, it was just'. What was it you were trying to express to me?"

I do not know why I asked him that. Normally, I would not pry into the privacy of others. Perhaps my head was more damaged than I first assumed.

Kirk remained silent; I thought he would decline to answer. But as I was being guided gently onto a stretcher, I thought I heard him say, almost too quietly and too quickly for me to hear, "I just didn't want to see you dead. Not you. I don't know why." And then I was whisked away.


	10. Phenomenon, II

_A/N: Yay. I am totally still counting this as Saturday evening! Just 'cause it's a couple hours past that....Whatever._

_Okay - Spock gets kinda out of character in this chapter. Just warning you. I didn't really see any way around it (though if you guys do, just shoot me a message PLEASE, I need help here) because what happens will cause tension/conflict/obstacles-Kirk-and-Spock-have-to-get-past-so-they-can-live-happily-ever-after later on in the story. But it made Spock OOC a bit. T.T_

_By the way, I've gotten really nice reviews (which I love very much because I am a praise addict - keep 'em coming XD), but I do welcome constructive criticism. Please guys, if you see something wrong or something that you don't like, TELL ME. I can't fix it if you don't._

_EDIT (Jan. 23): **NoOneShallKnow** caught my tense issues. I fixed them! You see, constructive criticism does work! Thank you._

_This is a disclaimer._

Phenomenon, II

During the ambulance ride to the hospital, the EMTs present insisted that I wear a neck brace because they were unable to tell the extent of the damage to my head and spinal cord. I attempted to convey the fact that I was only mildly bruised, and not even concussed - much. But they ignored my remonstrations and forced me to wear it until I was safely on a bed in the hospital, at which point I decided I wasn't obligated to wear it any longer and took it off, concealing it neatly under the bed.

A flurry of hospital personnel alerted me to the arrival of another patient being escorted to the bed next to mine. I recognized Zarabeth by her customary fur bikini rather than by her facial features, which were obscured under bloodstained bandages. I was impressed by the resiliency of the deceptive seemingly-fragile human body: Zarabeth was conscious. And talking.

"Spock, I'm so sorry!"

"Apologies are illogical. Please refrain from vocalizing them in my presence. Additionally, I do not believe you should attempt to speak with bandages over your mouth."

She ignored me. "I thought I was going to kill you! I was going too fast, and I hadn't realized the ice covering the front-"

She was cut off by the nurse who unwound the soiled bandages from her face, exposing a myriad of lacerations. The nurse dabbed at the cuts with antiseptic before running a dermal regenerator over them. I was wheeled away just as the nurse finished with Zarabeth to have my head scanned for injury.

Diagnosed with a minor concussion and not much else (split lip, bleeding nose, black eye, raised contusion on the back of my head, bruising along my left arm and that side of my back, and assorted aches), I was injected with a hypospray filled with PBH-Z6 to decrease the swelling on my frontal lobe and told to stay in the hospital while it took effect. I got a tissue and an aspirin for the other damages.

So I was confined in the emergency room, waiting, besieged by Zarabeth's constant apologies and promises to make it up to me. Eventually, I closed my eyes to aid my concentration in ignoring her. She kept up a flow of remorseful mumbling, but I was able to mull over the circumstances of my "lucky near-miss", specifically the actions of James Kirk.

He was strong to have flung the backpack so fast and so forcefully. But that was of little importance – I, or any Vulcan, could have done it with little effort, and most humans would be able to gain the required strength with the right training and practice. So Kirk worked out. It was a detail I filed away for later, but was in no way important compared to the second piece of information I garnered from analyzing his actions.

He was smart. Very, very perceptive and a very, very quick thinker. As far as I knew, he took multiple advanced placement classes, and earned exceptionally good grades. But from what I heard people say about him, and from what little I observed directly, he acted far less intelligent than I believe he was. The question then was why.

It might have been modesty, if Kirk were the type to be modest. It might have been to disorient people and make them underestimate him, but he had no reason to do so, not as a high school student. Because of my parent's occupations, I knew that those involved in politics deliberately made their opponents misjudge them, but Kirk had no valid cause that I could fathom for doing so himself. That left the option of human social customs: acting a certain way for the single purpose of "fitting in". However, that did not work either. Kirk's closest group of peers – Nyota Uhura, Montgomery Scott, Hikaru Sulu, and Pavel Chekov – had no reservations when it came to displaying their stunning, for humans, intellects. Additionally, Kirk made the impression that he did not care what other people thought of him. Or maybe Kirk's façade was simply a quirk of his personality.

No. I did not think that was the case. Unless the concussion was affecting me more than I thought, there was an incredibly irrational intuitive feeling that told me that there was some deeper mystery to James T. Kirk.

-------

"Is he sleeping?" a hushed voice asked. My eyes flew open. There was a human expression, something along the lines of discussing a religious antagonistic figure and having it teleport to the location of the speaker.

Kirk was standing at the foot of my bed, smirking. I gazed coolly at him while he moved to sit at the edge of Zarabeth's bed (she was ecstatic, I think, from having his buttocks at the perfect 'ogling' position) so he faced me.

"So, what's the verdict?" he inquired.

"I simply have to wait for the concussion medicine to work."

"Well, I've come to spring you; just call me your knight in shining armor….Not that you're much of a damsel."

"I see no springs in this room, much less ones with enough tension to 'spring' me. And I do not see the comparison between you and a medieval warrior, not to mention that most knights of the time lacked the supplies of time to make their armor shine, and -"

"It's slang," he interrupted, chucking gently. "Don't take it literally. Anyways, I need to talk to you. In private. Preferably now."

------

We ended up in a custodial closet, forced into close physical proximity due to the lack of space. It was distinctly…uncomfortable. In more than one way.

"Don't tell anybody," were the first words out of his mouth.

"Tell anybody what? That we were having a discussion in a closet? That you somehow managed to get into the hospital room despite the fact that only family are allowed access?"

"Um, that's a really interesting story, by the way. But I digress. Don't tell people that I saved you."

Puzzlement made me blunt: "Why?"

"Because…I don't want to deal with people telling me how awesome I am." It was a lie, obviously, a weak reason that he pulled from somewhere I have no desire to name.

"If you do not wish for me to ask questions about your motivations, James, you merely need to say so. Please do not disrespect us both by telling a falsehood. I wish to know why you make this request, though I will respect your privacy if you tell me that you have no intention of answering me."

"…It's private, then. I'd just rather not. I'm sorry. Just, please don't, y'know, tell. Just say that you remembered to duck at the last second."

We stood in silence for a seventeen point two tense seconds. The stillness was broken by my question, a question I did not mean to ask. But perhaps my concussion was worse than I thought.

"Why did you even bother then, James?" I realized that my words sounded harsher than I meant for them to be when I saw him wince. He said nothing, but his eyes were vulnerable as he schooled the rest of his face into a smiling mask.

He turned to go, opened the door –

"I am sorry." At first, I did not realize that I had been the one to say those words. But it was my voice, and my sentiments leaking through them.

He was frozen, and my unintended apology dangled between us awkwardly, as out of place as a rose garden in a Klingon military academy.

Slowly, ever so slowly, he turned his head over his shoulder to look me in the eyes. "It's…all right." Slowly, the rest of his body follows his head. "But someone once told me apologies are illogical and unnecessary." His smile was real, but tentative.

"Indeed?" I allow only the smallest measure of dry humor to color my voice, but he hears it, and his smile grows stronger, more stable.

"Also, it would be better if you call me Jim – I'm more used to it." He extended his hand towards me for a human handshake. After a moment's hesitation, I reached for it.

"Very well, Jim."

The touching of our hands, skin to skin, palm to palm, holy palmer's kiss, extended beyond the brush of fingertips that day in class, made my breath halt in my throat. I had my mental barriers up, but the sheer force of Jim's presence destroyed them. It was explosive, color and sound and feeling and life and I dug deeper and I did not care that I was violating his privacy and that I was doing what no other Vulcan would do should do and it felt right to know the innermost essence of him and I had barely scraped away the top layer the brilliant shining layer and I needed more and there was something underneath –

"Spock, there you are! I just got here, and the doctor said….Do you want me to leave you alone sweetheart?"

My mother was standing in the hallway beyond the closet, face carefully neutral. I hurriedly broke my handshake with Jim, my ears burning a vivid emerald in shame. Thankfully, he appeared not to have noticed that I had almost dived deep into his mind, almost committed what Vulcans considered a form of rape.

"Mother, I appreciate you taking time off from work to visit me. As you can see, I am physically mostly unharmed." She smiled at me and then looked pointedly at Jim. I understood the non-verbal communication. "If I may introduce you; Mother, this is Jim Kirk. I am acquainted with him through school, and he was, as you can see, kind enough to see how I was doing. Jim, this is my mother, the lady Amanda Grayson."

"A pleasure to meet you, Jim."

"Likewise, Lady Grayson."

My mother and I left, walking one way down the hall, leaving Jim standing in the doorway of the custodial closet. I did not look back, ashamed of what I had almost done, as good as done, done in his mind.

------

My mother said almost nothing on the way home, only asking me what had happened and if I was sure I was unharmed. I honored Jim's request to conceal his involvement, and I told my mother that I was fine. It was true. I just omitted certain things. Like the fact that the brief physical contact between Jim and I led to a mental contact that was, for many reasons, alarming.

At its deepest, a handshake should have just lead to a gentle brushing of the minds, not something similar to a one-way mind-meld. And my own actions were…beyond merely disturbing. My level of telepathic control was above that of many full-blooded Vulcans: there should have been no temptation to invade Jim's mind, and if there was, I should have had the ability to control it and to break the mental connection. But it was more than the fact that I did not want to do so (because, and I knew it, deep down, I _had not wanted_ to let go of his mind), it was that I _could_ not do so.

He did not appear to have felt my presence in his mind. I did not know how to react to that. Something in me wanted to act normal, as if nothing had happened, but another something told me that I should avoid him to protect him from what I could do if we ever touched again.

At least I got no further than the surface layer of his thoughts. I could be thankful for that.

------

I chose to meditate rather than sleep that night, pondering the problem that was Jim Kirk. Would I admit to him what I had done? Or not? Why did he ask me to keep his actions a secret? Why did my mind latch onto his like it did? Why could I not stop myself?

The morning brought no answers.


	11. Invitations, I

_It's a short one, sorry. But at least I have it up!_

_I am overwhelmed by everyone's reassurances that Spock was not OOC. Thank you all! And I won't complain about my own writing again (much) because I hate it when other people do it, and I don't want you guys to feel pressured to reassure me._

_I, Of Glorious Plumage, own no rights to either 'Twilight' or the Star Trek franchise, nor do I make any money off these writings._

Invitations, I

Events of the month following the accident settled into a pattern that was, my mother assured me, completely normal for adolescent humans. I was uneasy, tense, and, at first, slightly embarrassed.

I found myself the focus of the majority of the student body for approximately eight point five days after the incident involving myself, Zarabeth's van, and – unbeknownst to all but Jim and myself – Jim's backpack. Zarabeth trailed me constantly, so insistent on making amends to me that I feared the compulsion bordered on obsessive psychosis. Because I suffered no lasting damage, I attempted to convince her to abstain from further apologies – but she remained insistent. She followed me between classes and contrived to sit next to me at lunch. Actually, 'next to me' was inaccurate: she contrived to sit pressed up against my side, elbow digging uncomfortably into the flesh above my heart, moist breath irritating the tips of my sensitive ears.

-----------

In Xenobiology, Jim sat as far from me as the length of the table would allow, apparently completely oblivious to my presence as he flirted with all of the females and most of the males in class. Only occasionally, when his fists would suddenly clench, skin stretched white over metacarpals and joints, did I wonder if he was not as unaware as he appeared.

He knew what I had done when we shook hands, how my mind latched onto his, and he was disgusted by it – there was no other explanation for his suddenly brusque behavior.

The day after the accident, I tried to initiate conversation. "Hello, Jim," I said neutrally, keeping my hands far away from his to show him I meant not to repeat the event of the day before. All he did was turn his head a fraction towards me, avoiding my gaze, nod once, and look away.

And that was the last contact I had with him.

I wanted to – needed to – talk to him. I needed to tell him that I had not meant to invade the privacy of his mind. I needed to _apologize_.

------------

Janice, at least, seemed pleased by the obvious frigidity between Kirk and I, though she continued to be amiable to me. Confidently, she perched on the edge of his side of the table to chat with him in the moments before class started.

It did not bother me when she did that.

------------

The snow washed away completely under heavy rain after that one dangerously icy day.

------------

On March 5th, Christine called me at home to request that I attend the "girl's choice spring dance" with her. I had learned of the human tradition of "school dances" (an utterly illogical moniker as schools, being buildings, were unable to dance in any way) through my studies in alien cultures, but I had not anticipated being invited to one.

My response to her, while as polite as I could make it, was not what she had hoped to hear – her unhappiness leaked through her voice, even over the communicator – but it could not be helped. I enjoyed Christine's company, but I had no desire to accompany her in a social setting as a "couple". Furthermore, dancing would not have been…wise. Extended physical contact? Hand-to-hand contact? After what had transpired with Jim Kirk?

No. I would not attend the dance, not even for the 'valuable social and cultural experience' that my mother claimed I would gain by attending.

------------

The day after Christine commed me, Leila walked with me to Advanced Xenobiology instead of going to the class she was supposed to attend. She had seemed nervous at lunch, and was even more so while we walked, filling the silence with falsely chirpy small talk. I kept my face impassive and my answers short, slightly bored and slightly amused, hoping that she was able to "get to the point" and still get to her class.

One hundred and nine seconds before the bell rang, as we entered the Xenobiology room, she finally managed to say what she wanted to say:

"Spock, I was wondering if, maybe, you wanted to go to the dance with me. I mean, if you're not going with anyone else. Or even if you are – with someone else, I mean – it's not like anyone minds polyamory and, uh, I don't mean that it would be _amorous_ 'cause we could go as friends. If you wanted. But, um. Do you want to?"

I noticed that Kirk's head was tilted towards us, as if he were listening.

"I cannot, Leila. I know you must be disappointed, but please trust that my answer is not a reflection upon you."

"…Okay. It's okay."

There was a pause in the conversation before we both started speaking at once.

"You should go to your next class-"

"Why don't you want to-"

I gestured for her to continue speaking, though by now, she will most assuredly be late for her class.

"Why don't you want to go to the dance with me? Are you going with someone else?"

"I am not attending the dance at all. I have plans to visit Seattle." It was deceptive, but not untrue. I did want to go to Seattle, but I had no particular date in mind. I had simply implied that the latter phrase was the reason for the former.

"Oh."

"If you still desire to attend the dance, I do not believe Kevin Reilly would be averse to accompanying you. Additionally, I overheard Marlena telling Edith Keeler that she planned on inviting you." I knew, from observing his interactions with Leila, that Kevin enjoyed her company, and I _had_ heard Marlena talking to Edith, though no one else had (of course, no one else had superior hearing either).

The bell rang abruptly. With a kind, albeit quick, smile in my direction, Leila scurried out the door, passing Dr. Smith on his way in. Hastily, I sat down, noticing as I did that Kirk was watching me openly, the first acknowledgement of my presence in twenty days. His hazel eyes were curious, and frustrated, and pierced me to my katra.

* * *

_This is an extra A/N for **Sir Gawain of Camelot**, who made so many jokes about getting his name in bold that I had to do it. **Sir Gawain of Camelot ****Sir Gawain of Camelot ****Sir Gawain of Camelot ****Sir Gawain of Camelot.**_

_Also, **Miss Basset**! She is absolutely amazing. Go check her stuff out, say hi, support her. _


	12. Invitations, II

_Of Glorious Plumage has finally figured out how the stat page works. Of Glorious Plumage has many more readers than they first believed. Of Glorious Plumage now has pressure. All those people...all of them wanting a good story...Of Glorious Plumage is reduced to speaking in third person._

_Of Glorious Plumage would, however, ignore the pressure for a short moment to request that people go read "The Pineapple Saga - Book 1" by **Miss Basset **because **Miss Basset** is an amazingly good writer**. **She is also rewriting Twilight, but this time with characters from the TV show "Psych". Of Glorious Plumage also asks that you go take a look at "Obsession" by **Nero Shrimp** because **Nero Shrimp** continued the story after Of Glorious Plumage requested it__. _

_Of Glorious Plumage would like to thank everyone for their support, especially those who have initiated PM conversations. They know who they are._

_Of Glorious Plumage owns actions figures of Kirk and Spock. Of Glorious Plumage owns a first edition copy of "Twilight" that would be in pristine contition if it were not defaced with anti-Bella, anti-Edward, and anti-Twiliight comments written in shiny purple ink. Of Glorious Plumage does NOT own any rights to anything._

* * *

Invitations, II

After Leila left, it was difficult to ignore the way Kirk stared silently at me throughout class. When the bell rang (_at last_ a tiny aspect of my inner voice sighed), I turned my back to him to gather my belongings, expecting him to leave immediately as usual.

"Spock?" The cadence of his voice should not have sounded so familiar, as if I had known it all my life rather than for five weeks.

I turned slowly, gathering the time to compose myself after his unforeseen verbal communication. My expression was inscrutable when I faced him, his was nervous and wary. He said nothing.

"I would like to…make amends," I began, an unintended note of contrition in my voice, "For my -"

"Don't. You have nothing to apologize for." The words left his mouth hastily, unwieldy. It made me pause; if he had known what I had done to his mind, why was he refusing to acknowledge it? But what if he had _not_ felt the intrusion of my mind in his? It would explain why he said it would be unnecessary for me to apologize, but it would not clarify the motives behind his behavior of the past few weeks. After taking a deep breath, presumably to calm himself, he continued to speak:

"I know you don't like people saying this, but I am sorry." He sounded sincere, as far as I was able to judge. "I've been rude, but it's just….It's better that way." Sincere and serious.

"I do not comprehend the meaning of your words."

"It might be better if we're not friends."

"…Indeed?"

"If we avoided each other, things would be better."

"And avoiding me was not what you were doing these past twenty nine days?"

Kirk flinched a bit at that, but soldiered on. "Well, there were – Know what? Never mind that. How about I ignore you and you ignore me and we leave it at that? And whatever you were going to apologize for at the beginning of this conversation can be left alone too."

So Jim Kirk did not know that I had invaded – raped – his mind. I was not sure if I felt relieved that I was spared the unpleasantness that would have ensued after an outright declaration of mental misconduct, or if my feelings of guilt were exacerbated because I was not able to admit my monstrous actions and try to atone for them. All I knew was that I did not enjoy knowing that a person who not only saved my life but had extended a hand in friendship to me, literally and figuratively, was recanting that friendship for a reason that, while unclear, indubitably had something to do with me.

------------

That day, I was anticipating my departure from school: between the slight awkwardness of the conversation with Leila, and the not-so-slight awkwardness and resulting emotional turmoil from the conversation with Jim Kirk, I was more than ready to go home and calm down in my mother's soothing presence. I hurried to the truck, avoiding coming into physical contact with the myriad of people milling around the parking lot. My truck had suffered very minimal damage in the accident. I had had to replace the taillights and retouch the paint job; Zarabeth's van had to taken apart and sold as parts.

My step faltered when I rounded the corner and saw a tall, dark figure leaning against the side of my truck, but upon drawing closer, I saw it was Carlos Giotto. I knew him only vaguely: we ate lunch with the same group of people, and Christine had spoken highly of him, but outside of that, I had very little knowledge of the young man.

"Hello, Carlos," I called as I approached.

"Hey, Spock."

"Do you wish to speak to me?" I asked as I unlocked the door. I believed it was a logical assumption, based on the way he was, as humans would say, "hanging around".

"I-was-wondering-if-you-wanted-to-go-to-the-dance. With-me."

"If you would please repeat yourself at a slower pace, I had a hard time understanding what it was you said."

"I was, um, wondering if you, well, wanted to go to the dance with me?" His cheeks reddened with the flow of blood brought about by embarrassment. "I hear you turned down Chris and Leila, so I thought maybe you, y'know, swing the other way." The last part was mumbled, and Carlos directed his gaze to the ground. I was slightly puzzled: on Vulcan, homosexuality was considered ignominious as unions in which the partners were of the same gender could produce no offspring. But I had been lead to believe that on Earth all sexualities and lifestyles were accepted. Maybe he was raised in a conservative family.

"I thank you for your consideration and kindness in asking, but I am not attending the dance at all. I have made plans to visit Seattle."

"Oh," he said forlornly. It occurred to me then that I had not been very courteous to him when I quickly dismissed his invitation. It must have taken him considerable amounts of courage to ask someone he hardly knew to attend a social gathering _and_ admit to having a sexuality he obviously found shameful. But I had no opportunity to soften my harsh words as Carlos had already walked dejectedly away. And Carlos' third invitation made me remember how unkindly I had rejected Christine's.

My day was just improving with each passing moment. I was experiencing negative emotions concerning Leila, Carlos, Christine, _and_ Kirk. At least, as my mother was fond of saying, it wasn't raining.

Just then, I noticed Jim Kirk walking past the front of my truck, studiously avoiding looking at me. I opened the door with perhaps more force than I needed and climbed inside, shutting it firmly behind me, before I reversed into the aisle. Kirk was already in his car, two spaces down, sliding smoothly in front of me, cutting me off. He stopped there – to wait for the others going to Captain Pike's home with him; I could see the four of them approaching. In my rearview mirror, I observed a line of cars forming. Immediately behind me, Zarabeth was in her recently acquired Zephyr, waving.

While I was waiting, I heard a knock on my window. Looking over, I saw it was Zarabeth. In the rearview mirror, I saw that her hovercar was still running, the door left open. I cranked the window down.

"I realize that the wait is inconvenient. As you can see, I am halted behind Jim Kirk."

"Oh, I know – I just decided to take the opportunity to ask you something while we're trapped here." She grinned. "Wanna go to the spring dance?"

"I am going to Seattle, Zarabeth." My voice might have been a little bit sharp.

"Yeah, Leila said that."

"Why, then, would you-"

She shrugged and adjusted her bikini, tugging the fur so it covered a larger portion of her breasts. "I was hoping you were just letting her down easily. Anyways, I still need to make up to you for almost killing you."

"That is not necessary. And I really am going to Seattle." Suddenly, I remembered how callous I was to Carlos. "However, I appreciate your willingness to attempt to atone by including me in social traditions."

"Really? Well, I'll take you to prom then!"

And before I could respond, she was walking back to her car and Kirk was speeding away.


	13. Invitations, III

_Oh, goodness, it's been a whole WEEK! I'm sorry it took so long, but real life you know?_

_Thanks to everyone who reviewed/favorited/subscribed - love you all._

_This is a disclaimer._

* * *

Invitations, III

After continually implying to people that I planned to go to Seattle on the day of the dance, I found myself growing ever partial to actually making the visit on that day. It was as good a day as any and my deception would cease to be such, which would assuage any remorse I felt over my not-lies.

"Mother?" I asked near the end of dinner.

"Yeah, sweetie?"

"Next Saturday, I am planning to travel to Seattle for the day, if you have no objections." I did not want to ask permission – which might have been a sign of the 'teenage rebellion' typical in Human adolescents – but neither did I want to do anything against my mother's wishes.

"Why?" She sounded surprised, unable to imagine a logical reason to visit the city when everything we needed was in Sporks.

"As I am now living on this world, I wish to experience some of its culture. That can be achieved in a city like Seattle. Additionally, Sporks lacks stores or libraries where I can acquire paper books; chances of locating a bookstore are increased in a large city."

"Ah, right. I almost forgot that you enjoy those antiques so much."

"Enjoyment is an emotion, Mother."

"All right, whatever you say, dear," she paused, seemed to ponder something. "Are you going all by yourself?" She looked a bit worried.

"Yes."

"It's a big city – you could run into trouble," she fretted.

"Mother, I often spent time in Shi'Kahr alone and had no difficulties or prejudicial experiences whatsoever."

"But that was on Vulcan; Earth is so much different! Maybe I should go with you."

"While I enjoy spending time in your company, I had wished to explore on my own. If I encounter any trouble, I am physically stronger and faster than any human and so can 'take care of myself'."

My mother sighed a bit. "All right, you can go." Her voice took on a teasing note, "but I thought that enjoyment was an emotion?"

"Thank you, Mother," I said, but did not reply to her last comment, focusing instead on masticating a bite of my dinner.

------------

The next morning, when I pulled into the parking lot, I deliberately parked as far as possible from the car I identified as Kirk's. I recognized that avoiding him would also enable me to avoid any distressing encounters with him. Considering that out last interaction had ended with him telling me that we should ignore one another for reasons unknown to me and the one before that ended with me inadvertently invading his mind, I thought my decision was justified.

But, somehow, despite my precaution, I could not avoid literally running into him in the crowded hall of the main school building.

I did not quite scowl at him, but I am sure my face took on a bit of a harsher non-expression as he offered a quiet "Morning, Spock" to me.

"May I inquire as to why you saw fit to block the traffic leading out of the parking lot yesterday afternoon?" I asked. "I was under the impression that you were attempting to pretend I do not exist, not trying to irritate me. Although, if the latter was your goal, you are very close to succeeding and, should that occur, you will regret that you ever tried to do so," I stated calmly, though I was shocked that such words were issuing from my mouth.

He snickered. "Was that a treat? Anyways, it was for Zarabeth's sake, not mine. Had to give the poor girl a chance."

I inhaled, reciting the teachings of Surak in my mind, drawing calmness from the logic.

"And I'm not pretending you don't exist," he continued.

"So irritation is your goal. Very well. Now I must get to class. You have made me late." I stomped – no, _walked calmly_ – down the now-empty hall.

"Wait!" Kirk called. "Um, yesterday, I only said it would be better _if_ we were to ignore each other, that we _should_, not that I was actually going to do it! I still want to be friends. You're kinda sensitive, you know that?"

So he was friendly at first, and then he was not, and then…

"Do you suffer from a multiple personality disorder?" I asked severely.

"Nope."

"Schizophrenia?"

"Uh, no."

"Psychosis? A general sociopathic disorder?

"No and no – although there was this one counselor who, um, actually, never mind. I just wanted to ask you something, but you sidetracked me."

"…What do you want to ask?"

"Well, next Saturday – the day of the dance –"

"Are you attempting to be humorous? Because you are failing miserably – I am not amused," I interrupted him.

"Sheesh, let me _finish_!"

I clasped my hands behind my back, resisting the illogical urge to nerve pinch his neck. "Proceed."

"I heard you say you were going to Seattle that day, and I just wondered if you wanted a ride or someone to go along with you or anything."

One of my mother's favorite clichés was the phrase 'thrown for a loop'. I had not truly understood it's meaning until Kirk's offer.

"I am assuming that it would be with yourself, and that you are not making the offer on another's behalf, Kirk."

"Yup," he beamed, "and it's Jim. If we're going to be friends even if we shouldn't be, you have to call me Jim. It should be a law, but I don't think any politicians will bother passing a piece of legislature like that."

"I imagine not."

"So, what about it? You, me, Seattle? I was planning to go sometime within the next month anyway, and it's more fun with a friend."

Friend…That word made me confused – were we really friends now? Would we remain friends? It was hard to keep up with Kirk's – Jim's – emotional vagaries. But I nodded in response to his query, not sure if I really meant it or not. His answering smile was nothing short of blinding.


	14. Blood Type, I

Blood Type, I

Due to my encounter with Jim, I was appallingly late to my first period class, and felt bizarrely unsettled throughout it. It was not until the end of class that I fully comprehended the fact that Christine had been trying to talk to me. She was concerned about my hazy mental state, and looked suspicious when I attempted to explain to her that it was simply because I did not meditate enough (which was, from a certain perspective, true – I had meditated for the usual amount of time last night, but it was not adequate in trying to understand, or deal with, the walking headache that was Jim Kirk). Despite her obvious disbelief at my excuse, she did not pry, respecting my need for privacy, and smoothly changed the subject to talk about the impending trip to L'Psuh.

The rest of the morning seemed duller than usual. It was difficult for me to analyze Jim's words and actions: he wanted to be friends, and yet did not think that we should be, but whatever reasons were behind his misgivings had nothing to do with my atrocious mental invasion. And would he change his mind again? He seemed particularly susceptible to emotional vagaries, something a human would describe as "running hot and cold" – but without, I think, the sexual connotations.

----------------

I was ambushed when I walked into the cafeteria for lunch.

Jim Kirk had been lurking near the doors and when I walked in, he pounced, throwing his arm across my shoulders in a disgusting violation of my physical space and stealing my lunch bag from my hand. When I tried to pull away, he tightened his grip.

"Ladies," he said suavely to Christine and Janice, who I had been walking with, "I hope you don't mind if I borrow Spock for lunch today. I promise I won't break him." He accompanied his words with a wink. Christine giggled and blushed, while Janice appeared as if she did not know whether to swoon because of Jim or to glare at me.

As I could think of no acceptably inoffensive or logical reason for refusing to sit with Jim, I allowed myself to be lead to a table in the corner of the cafeteria, attempting to shrug free of his arm without resorting to my superior Vulcan strength, which would undoubtedly result in his injury. Halfway to the table I asked him if he would not terribly mind releasing me.

"Liberate yourself from my viselike grip," he laughed, and tightened his hold further. It was…awkward…to walk with him in such a manner.

He finally let go of me when we reached our seats so that he could sit across from me. We were silent for thirty two seconds while he pulled an apple out from somewhere (crude Terran slang would dictate that the apple came from his ass, but that was highly unlikely – however, I did not discern any place where it could have appeared from) and I sat rigidly ignoring my lunch to study him. He broke the silence, stating with his mouth full of half-masticated apple:

"So I figured that if I'm going to be friends with you, I should do it all the way. I mean, I'm not the type of person that other people should hang out with, but screw that."

"You are making less sense than usual. Please, clarify."

"Um…I can't." His voice might be tinged with sadness – if so, it is too slight for me to confirm.

"Do you engage in habits that would make you a bad influence? Do you often seek to destroy relationships? Do you - "

"Nothing like that! Not really. I'd rather not say right now. But how about a deal? I'll tell you if you agree that you'll give this friendship thing a try. I'm going to try to make this work out, and I want you to too."

The conditions of his proposal puzzled me. "I have already agreed to enter into a platonic relationship with you. Additionally, it makes no sense for you to tell me why we should not be in such a relationship _after_ we are actually in it."

"…Damn. I should have known you would call me out on that with your Vulcan super-logic and everything. But that's not _really_ the point. The point is that you've just _said_ that we could be friends, but haven't given any proof of that with you actions. I want to know if you'll be committed, if I can trust you. And I need to trust you before I can tell you anything. Unfortunately, I don't think you'll trust me unless I tell you. It's a nasty little catch-22."

His logic was admirable, for a human, except for one thing: "But have I not given you physical evidence of my friendship? I am sitting here with you rather than with Christine and Janice."

"But you're not comfortable with me. You didn't like me touching you – and please don't give me that Vulcan personal bubble crap – you haven't eaten your lunch, you're clutching the edge of the table so hard I think you're going to break it in a moment, and if you sat any straighter I'm pretty sure your spine would snap backwards. You _say_ we can be friends, but you act like you have a pole up your ass." He sighed, his hazel eyes somber.

"I am seriously reevaluating my opinion to enter into a friendship with you, your observational skills notwithstanding."

"What?!" His gaze snapped up.

"Please refrain from being so base."

"That offended you?" He started chuckling. "You're such a prude! I like that!"

I did not dignify that with a reply.

My attention was diverted from Jim when I noticed the approach of Hikaru Sulu, one of the young men Jim lived with at Captain Pike's. When Jim accosted me and dragged me to the table, I noticed that the group of people he usually sat with – Sulu, Pavel Chekov, Montgomery Scott, and Nyota Uhura – had watched our progress with varying expressions of amusement and annoyance, and I had quickly forgotten them when Jim and I began our conversation.

"Jim, I just found out that you'll be blood typing in Xenobio today," he said in an agitated manner, "I thought you would want to know." His attention turned to me. "You must be Spock; I'm Hikaru." He held out his hand for me to shake.

"It is very nice to meet you," I returned, but declined to take his hand which seemed to discomfit him, and after a moment of what he surely felt as awkwardness, he lowered his hand to his side.

"Really? Thanks, Hikaru. I'll have to pass on class today then. I'll go now, Spock – the bell's about to ring anyways," Jim said and got up hastily from the table.

"You are not attending class?" I was confused by that. I knew of the practice of skipping, or 'playing hooky', though it was abhorred to the point of being taboo to mention on Vulcan, where education was of immense importance, but I could not understand how an intelligent person like Jim would so frivolously decide to skip a class.

"Nope. Ditching can be healthy sometimes – you know, take off some of the mental stress. Whatever. See you around." He turned to leave, but then paused. "And think about what I said, our little illogical deal on trust."

And, suddenly, like one of Vulcan's sandstorms, he was gone in as abrupt a manner as he had arrived.

* * *

_In honor of J.D. Salinger, I have included a "Catcher in the Rye" reference. If you can catch it - kudos to you._

_Also, I wrote two single-chapter fics that got some amazing responses - which means I really want to write more ('cause fanfiction has turned me into a review whore), but that would mean that updates on "Sporks" would take about a week. I think I probably will start to write some other stories, so I just wanted to give you guys a heads up. I will always be working on "Sporks" (because I love it best), and I promise to update at least once a week, but I won't be working at the rate which I started at (I think I got the first few chapters out within a few days of each other)._

_Thank you for reading._

_(This is a disclaimer.)_


	15. Blood Type, II

_I know it's short, but at least it's up! And within my self-imposed deadline, too!!! (Well, kind of - it's been eight days, but I'm one of those people who believe a week ends on Sunday at midnight.) I am so proud of myself!_

_I want to say "Thank you for the support and the awesome messages" to **Miss Bassett** (who is a very nice person, and a very good writer), **Dementation **(who wrote an excellent Twilight fic about an insane Bella), and **Sir Gawain of Camelot** (who I love and whose message I have recieved but have not yet gotten around to replying to). And to everyone who's reviewed so far: I adore you all and would give you hugs if I could._

_I neither own rights to this fic, nor do I make money off of it._

* * *

Blood Type, II

The bell rang, shrill and piercing, reminding me that, as fascinating as I found Jim Kirk's personality (all the contradictions, the hints of mental trauma or instability, the way he hid his intelligence – it would be enough to send any psychologist into spasms of excitement), I had to attend class. Exiting the cafeteria, I spared one glance back at Jim, confirming that he had not visibly moved.

Dr. Smith was not present in the room when I arrived, which was beneficial as I happened to be three point one seconds late. I settled into my seat, aware that both Christine and Janice were staring at me. Janice's face was twisted horrendously in what I believed to be envy, but she hastily rearranged it into a pleasant smile when I looked at her. Christine's physiognomy was enigmatic.

Dr. Smith entered the room then, arms filled with cardboard boxes. "Today you get a treat: A surprise celebration of knowledge!" Many of my classmates groaned as they recognized Dr. Smith's choice idiom for 'pop quiz'.

"But wait, there's more!" he exclaimed, "Aren't you all excited?" No one vocalized any dissent, but I believed that the answer would have been resoundingly negative if they had. Dr. Smith continued, a large smile on his face, "We'll be doing a bit of a historical activity before the celebration of your knowledge. Before they invented tricorders, humans had all sorts of bizarre practices they used to classify and diagnose medical stuff. To check blood types, they had to prick their fingers and smear the blood on an indicator card. Which is what you will be doing right now." He opened the top of the boxes, revealing indicator cards and sterile micro-lancets. "Go for it."

I recognized the importance of gaining an understanding of anachronistic practices, but to actively apply that understanding seemed useless: It was improbable, though not impossible, that we would ever be in a situation where we would have to check someone's blood type in such an archaic manner. Additionally, as I was already aware that I had rare T-negative blood, the activity would offer me no new knowledge.

I pricked my finger with more calmly than many of my classmates did – some of them giggled, some of them complained. All but Christine and Janice were making noise. I looked at them:

"I want to be a nurse," Christine called to me as she met my gaze, "so I have to get used to blood. This is really fun!"

"Ugh," moaned Janice as she fainted.

--------------

As I was considerably (three-fold, to be precise) stronger than my peers, the task of transporting Janice to the nurse's office fell to me. Though she regained consciousness within seventy-five seconds after collapsing, she remained nauseous and mentally disjointed.

To avoid needless physical contact with her, I slung one of Janice's arms across my shoulders and wrapped my own arm about her waist, supporting ninety-three percent of her weight, though she still moved her feet in a mockery of walking. We were within nineteen meters of the nurse's office when Janice stilled.

"Just let me sit for a minute, please?" she begged.

I helped her sit on the sidewalk, where she promptly slumped over, pressing her face to the freezing cement as if it offered her comfort, her hair in its woven pattern becoming slightly disarrayed. Her skin was a worrisome shade of grey-tinted white. I pointed it out to her. She just groaned.

"Spock? Janice?" a familiar voice called from twelve-point-four meters directly behind me. "What's wrong – is she hurt?" Jim Kirk ran to my side, looking worried.

"She fainted. She might do it again," I told him.

"From pricking her finger?"

"Yes."

"You want help taking her to the nurse?"

"I am managing adequately on my own, Jim, thank you," I replied.

"NO!" Janice's outburst surprised Jim and I. "I mean, yes, we do need help. How about you carry me," she simpered at Kirk from her position on the ground, "and Spock can open the door for us or something."

Jim stared at her for two seconds, almost as expressionless as a Vulcan who had successfully completed Kolinahr, before starting to laugh.

"Though it is illogical to make assumptions, I think that you are no longer in need of assistance if you can be so energetic in expressing your preferences," I could not help saying. Jim laughed even harder.

"Umm…" she said, and then dropped her head back onto the pavement, trying to make us believe she had fainted.

"All right," Jim said, still chucking slightly, "we can humor you. Just keep whichever hand is bloody in your pocket or something." He bent down to take her limp form in his arms.

--------------

We left Janice with the nurse and made our way back outside. With our chore done, an uncomfortable silence fell between us (that is, if I could feel uncomfortable, and if an abstract concept like silence could do such a thing as 'fall', but I supposed the terminology was acceptable as the English language allowed for many different paradoxes). I stopped the illogical meanderings of my thoughts.

I had two questions to ask Jim but did not know how to phrase them in a manner that would not be offensively blunt, and Jim seemed to know that I had questions but did not want to initiate conversation with me. But my reserve failed me, and I found myself asking Jim in a most direct manner the less awkward of my two questions:

"What were you doing before you approached Janice and I? You lead me to believe that you were going to absent yourself from school."

"Just the for the one class, not for the rest of the day," he told me, "I was listening to music in my car."

I did not know quite how to respond as I did not know what people typically did when skipping school. I asked my second question, emboldened by the frank response to the first. "May I ask why you insisted that Janice hide her hand?"

Jim stared at me, assessing me. "You are really passive-aggressive, you know that?"

"I believe my mother once said something similar, though I have no idea why. Vulcans are never aggressive in any way."

"Passive-aggressive and deliberately obtuse. Or is that your sense of humor?"

"It might be. Is that your way of avoiding the question?"

"Damn, you caught me," Jim grinned sheepishly. "It's a bit embarrassing. After all, it's people like Janice Rand who don't like blood, not people like James Kirk."

"You suffer from hemophobia?"

"In a way, I guess…" he trailed off. "Hey, you want to hang out with me until the end of the period? It wouldn't kill you to take a break from school for a bit."

"There is a test. Also, I see no place where we can hang, except from a tree, which I find unsafe."

That made him laugh again. "Not hang-hang, but spend-some-time-with-me-hang. It's a slang term. And I think missing one test is okay – I'm missing it too."

I knew it was wrong to neglect my education, but the way Jim's hazel eyes gazed into mine made me agree to his offer.


	16. Blood Type, III

__

_Sorry for the long wait! Also, it's a bit short. -_- I'll try to have a longer one...soon? And I meant to begin a new fic this week as well, but my life got a bit hectic. When it calms down, I'll start posting._

* * *

Blood Type, III

Chastising myself for my actions, I tried to formulate excuses for a hasty departure while I followed Jim through the parking lot. It was hard to believe that I would do something as impulsive, as unintelligent, as

illogical as deliberately absenting myself from class – and a test – in favor of 'hanging out' with Jim Kirk. To rectify the situation I attempted, as politely as possible, to remove myself. My subtler attempts failed, so I turned to tactics of a more blunt nature.

"Jim, I left my belongings in class."

"My communicator is in my car; if you want, we can call Christine and get her to bring them out after class."

"Jim, we are both missing a test."

"Hey, cool! We can make it up together!"

"Jim, Dr. Smith will be most displeased by our actions."

"Well, I'm kinda used to being in deep shit with my teachers, but I can probably convince Janice to tell Smith that you stayed with her in the nurse's office. That should keep you out of trouble."

"'In deep shit'? Jim, I assure you that I have no wish to remain in acquaintance with people who immerse themselves in feces, especially when they do it with their teachers. It is unsanitary in the extreme." I knew what the idiom meant, but a part of me – the human part, perhaps, the part that laughed at my mother's witticisms, the part that I never revealed to any of my Vulcan peers – could not resist making such a crass joke.

(I should note that while my statement was phrased humorously, I was still serious. If Jim had enough delinquent habits to so often provoke the ire of his teachers it was possible that he would be a negative influence on me. I would have to ask him to clarify the nature of the 'deep shit' he got in before developing a friendship with him.)

Laughing, for it seemed that despite my stoic countenance Jim comprehended that I was making a joke, he clapped a hand on my shoulder in a companionable way. I stiffened under the touch and threw up all the mental barriers I could muster. I was wearing a shirt, of course, so the contact was not of a skin-to-skin nature and was, therefore, not as horribly invasive as it would have been otherwise. I still picked up surface emotions – amusement mostly – but I did not invade his mind as I had before.

I sidestepped the touch after a frozen moment. As his laughter tapered off, Jim gave me an enigmatic look, but kept his hands to himself as we made our way in silence to his car, where we both started speaking in unison.

"I have misgivings -"

"You know, I understand -"

We paused, looked at each other, gestured for the other to go first, began talking together again. The farce repeated once more before Jim, in a slightly childish manner, clamped his lips shut and looked at me expectantly till I started talking.

"I have concerns about continued contact between us," I told him, "The most immediate one has to do with our current actions. I am not in the habit of skipping class, and I do not intend to make it a habit. Indeed, I am beginning to regret my impulsive acquiescence to your invitation. If friendship with you will lead to further rule-breaking, then I must sever that friendship. Additionally, I need to know why you get in trouble with your teachers so often." What I told him was the truth, harshly-phrased perhaps, but it got my point across. It was not, however, the whole truth. I had a third reason for avoiding his company, a reason that had everything to do with my mental trespasses rather than his behavior. But I realized that it would be an epic fail, to use a common saying, to try to explain that to him in a way that would make it clear I had had no intentions of doing what I did; the explanation would take some form of the "_It's not you, it's me_" excuse. But with telepathy as a factor.

Jim looked almost relieved when I told him about my qualms. "That's similar to what I wanted to discuss with you. It occurred to me that you probably weren't too keen on playing hooky, so I totally understand if you want to go back to class now. I swear it won't hurt my feelings," he paused to flash a self-deprecating smile my direction. "I also understand why you wouldn't want to hang out with a trouble-maker. And I guess I fit that description. But it's more that…" Jim searched for words, "I don't really want to conform. That's the simple way of putting it. It's hard to analyze myself, the reasons for my actions, so I'm sorry if I can't offer a better explanation." He gazes intently into my eyes, waiting for me to make my judgment.

"I am trained to make my decisions in a scientific manner," I said, aware that I was avoiding making a decision, aware that I was uncomfortable under the intensity of those hazel eyes, "and because facts must be supported by extensive observations, I must spend more time in your company before concluding whether or not you would affect me in a negative manner." I was aware, also, that being around Jim to figure out if I should be around him exemplified flawed reasoning. But I saw no other way. And if I treated it as a science experiment in social interaction, I would be much less susceptible to any of the aforementioned negative effects of Jim Kirk; my mindset would be clinical and calculating.

Jim chuckled. I believe he knew as well as I did how illogical I was being – he was certainly intelligent, and exceedingly perceptive.

"Well, then, Spock, I believe we should talk some things over. Is now okay? Or do you want to go back to class?"

The three-point-seven-five seconds after that were beyond description. The choice hovered before me, almost tangible, and for those breathless seconds I did not know what I would choose. But I made a choice – not knowing if it were the right one or the wrong one – not knowing if it would haunt me for the rest of my life – not knowing if anything hinged on that decision – not knowing anything and agonizing over that fact.

"Now is acceptable. I would be late enough if I returned to class now that I might as well not return."


	17. Blood Type, IV

_A/N: I am so sorry to be AWOL for so long. I don't even have an excuse. Thanks to everyone who still supported me, though. (We've broken 100 reviews!)_

Blood Type, IV

* * *

We sat in his car. Me and him. Him and me. Jim and I. Against all reason, I had deliberately absented myself from class for the sole purpose of 'hanging out' with Jim Kirk. It was an…illogical thing for me to do. (I realized that I used the term 'illogical' more in the time since I arrived on earth than in all my years on Vulcan.)

We were in his car because we had considered the idea of driving somewhere "fun" – his adjective. But we could not decide on an appropriate place, or, rather, I disliked all the ideas he proposed. So we just sat.

I believe he was waiting for me to start the conversation, not because he was shy but because he wanted me to choose a topic I felt comfortable with. My nature, however, and that of any Vulcan, is such that I am not in the habit of initiating the light banter known as 'small talk'. And even if I wanted to, I could not think of a topic that would entertain us both and offend neither of us.

Even with my mother, I rarely began conversations.

…

Ah. In the human cartoon tradition of an imaginary light fixture turning on above my head, an idea sprung into my mind.

Mothers.

It would be a 'safe topic': most humans love their parents, or the people who stand in for their parents and I would be able to provide a Vulcan view of a human mother.

"What are some of the characteristics of the average human mother?" I queried. It was, in my opinion, a favorable start; it was not personal and so allowed for conversational growth in that direction, and it allowed Jim a chance to steer the conversation by the way he chose to answer.

"Well," he began, shifting in the seat to face me, "it depends on the mother, I guess. Some are great and kind and loving, and some might be a bit distant because they're too busy working, and some are really crappy." His voice hardened on the last five words, unintentionally I believe, though he kept his face arranged in a very convincing smile.

_Maybe,_ I thought, _his mother is one of the latter._ But I could not be certain so, though it was rude and insensitive, I asked:

"And what are the qualities of your mother specifically?"

His hand had been resting loosely on the steering wheel. When I asked my question, his hand tightened until the knuckles whitened. He had not meant for me to notice his discomfort, because he kept smiling and the rest of his body remained in the same relaxed position, but he had underestimated my skills in casual observation. A human might not have seen the clenching of his hand, but I was not human.

"Actually, I don't see her much. Starfleet, y'know. I know you know I live with Chris Pike – his former XO is like a mother to me. We all call her Number One because Chris always called her that, and she's pretty much the alpha in the house. Don't tell Chris I said that, by the way."

The subtle shift from the topic of his mother to Number One did not escape me.

"In what way is she such a dominant member of the household? And why do you fear Captain Pike's reaction?"

He laughs – a golden sound, genuine, the discomfort surrounding his mother banished. "She's the one in charge of discipline and rule-making and general running of the house. But we all depend on her for food, too. She's pretty much the only one who can cook. Nyota won't – says it would enforce 'stereotypical gender-roles and the oppression of women". Pavel tried to make stroganoff once and nearly burned the house to the ground. The rest of us don't even bother. I mean, we have a replicator, but you can only go so long without real food." He paused, looked at me, somehow prophesized what I was going to ask: "And don't be obtuse and say that the stuff from the replicator isn't imaginary. You know better than that."

I did not intend for it to do so, but my eyebrow arched higher. Jim laughed again.

"And Chris' reaction. Physically, he's in really bad shape – has to be in a wheelchair, sometimes has trouble talking. He doesn't like it when people think less of him for that, when they look at him and assume that just because he can barely move on his own he also has mental damage. He also has this thing about being in command. So when we defer to Number One instead of him, he thinks it's because he's a cripple and she's not."

"But it is not?"

"Hell no! We respect him, and love him like a father, but she's the one who can strike fear into our hearts when we stay out past curfew. Although, I have to admit it really, really hurts when he gets angry and rams into you – those wheelchairs have more sharp edges on them than you think."

I remained silent, thinking about Jim's families. His biological one, which he avoided talking about (maybe it was because he simply spent more time with Christopher Pike and Number One, maybe it was for some darker reason) and the one he seemed more comfortable with. The Pike household must have been…dynamic. It intrigued me.

I would have contemplated it for a longer amount of time, but Jim wanted to carry on the conversation.

"What about your family? I know your father's on Vulcan and your mother's here, even though they're still married. But what about siblings? Pets?"

Drawn by his charisma, I found myself speaking about my half-brother, Sybok, and the _shelat _my father owned, I'Chaya. I purposefully excluded some information, like the fact that my brother had been named "Vulcan without logic" and banished in disgrace, or that I'Chaya's death had been my fault.


	18. Scary Stories, I

Scary Stories, I

The conversation I had with Jim Kirk during the time when I should have been in class was not unproductive (although I did make a vow to myself that I would never deliberately and illogically absent myself from school ever again except under the most dire conditions – I did not want to slip into a life of delinquency). I gained two additional insights into Jim's life, both of which I only realized long after our conversation was over.

The first was that he was, for some reason, banned from the grounds of the Vulcan Science Academy on Earth.

Near the close of our dialogue, I inquired as to whether he planned on attending the upcoming trip to the beach at L'Psuh. Christine had invited me and I was content to acquiesce to her (not only would it fulfill my mother's desire for me to be more socially outgoing, but there was a chance that I could make the acquaintance of Vulcan students and have the opportunity to move in a more refined, logical social group. Not that there was anything wrong with my human acquaintances. They were just…human). I saw no reason not to invite Jim: I enjoyed his company and I knew that, according to human standards of friendship, I was expected to offer to include friends in some of my activities.

Jim's answer to my query was as follows:

"Well, the lady in charge of that place – T'Pau, I believe her name is – spouted off something about me and Article 2334.6 of the Academy rules, but I plan to be there, yeah."

I was not familiar with Article 2334.6 at that time. Later that night, curious about the exact nature of the Article, I did some research on my PADD.

Article 2334.6 of Vulcan Science Academy Rules, translated into Federation Standard from Vulcan reads "Any person, student or otherwise, who is deemed to have an adverse effect on the majority of the population at the Academy, or has violated any Academy-specific or planetary rule or law, or is in any other way unfit to visit or inhabit the grounds of the Academy shall be permanently banned or expelled."

The second thing I realized was that Jim disliked discussing his biological family.

I had not realized it at the time, but Jim had continually and carefully steered our conversation away from his parents. He seemed more than enthusiastic when talking about the group of people he currently lived with, but he volunteered no concrete information on his parents or any siblings of his.

When I added those two pieces of information to the ones I already had, I was more confused than ever about Jim Kirk. My mind was susceptible to the pull of his mind; he went through odd mood shifts; he had a psychological aversion to blood; he was banned from the grounds of the Vulcan Science Academy; and, for someone who seemed to enjoy talking, he avoided certain common topics.

_A/N: This is my shortest chapter ever, and I am really sorry if you expected more. It's also a character-study chapter - so, really extremely boring. But I haven't updated in two weeks and I figured that something, no matter how short and boring, was better than nothing. Luckily, I've already started the next chapter and not only is it long and exciting, but it has Bones in it! Yay! Just hold on for another couple of days? Maybe a week if something horrible happens to me._


	19. Scary Stories, II

_A/N: I'm really sorry about the long wait between updates. I know I said a week, and I honestly thought I could do it. Then my computer erased my files. I managed to get them back up....just in time to fall prey to a nasty chunk of writer's block. I felt really guilty for not upholding my word, which put me in a worse mood and made it harder to write._

_The most amazing thing, though, is all the support and encouragement I got from Sir Gawain of Camelot, Miss Bassett, TheProblematique, fabulous dahling, and all the rest of you who left really nice reviews. You all possess my heart. If you want it._

_Disclaimer: If I owned Star Trek, I wouldn't be writing fanfiction._

Scary Stories, II

As I predicted, my mother was enthusiastic about my intentions to visit L'Psuh; she was glad that I had human friends who thought highly enough of me to extend invitations to social gatherings. I, while not emotional as my mother was about the upcoming event, still appreciated it for the chance it would give me to visit my Vulcan peers.

Privately, I also had to admit that I was curious to see how Jim Kirk would get into and act at the Academy – would he be able to avoid detection for the entirety of the outing? What would happen to him if he were caught by someone who knew he was banned from campus? And, would I be able to find out the cause of that banishment?

Those questions fascinated me in a way that I have heard Terrans are often fascinated, metaphorically, by crashing automobiles.

Saturday morning, I rose early to prepare for the trip but was distracted when, twenty-five point eight minutes into my meditations, an unusual brightness filled my room. Golden light was streaming through my windows from a sun that was for once, by some unpredicted meteorological vagary, not rising behind a thick layer of grey clouds. For an instant, I felt a strange sense of buoyancy, but I buried the illogical feeling quickly.

My mother had also risen early and, despite my protests, cooked a breakfast of synthetic scrambled eggs for me.

"I really wish that you would eat real eggs, just this once, dear," she said as she bustled around the kitchen, "they're high in protein and you need lots of fuel if you're going to be playing on the beach – no, no, Spock, let me get that." I put down the glass I was going to pour juice into as my mother pushed me into a chair and took the glass herself.

"Mother, please refrain from implying I am a gasoline-powered vehicle. And I will not be 'playing' on the beach-"

"Aww, you're so cute when you're indignant."

"-I will be engaging in sophisticated Terran rituals of socialization and communication as well as interacting with the Vulcan students."

"Whatever you say, sweetie," she teased gently as she put my meal on the table before me.

* * *

I met Christine, Janice, and Zarabeth (who was celebrating the relatively nice weather by wearing a bikini of the regular meant-for-swimming variety rather than the fur variety) in the parking lot of the store Christine's family owned. There were eight others in the group, including Marla, Gary Mitchell, Carlos Giotto (who, thankfully, appeared perfectly amicable despite my rejection of his offer to take me to a school-sponsored activity), and M'Ress. Jim was not there.

"You came!" Christine smiled, delighted when she saw me approach.

"I told you I intended to do so," I reminded her.

Within two point one minutes, the whole group managed to arrange everything and everyone into two small vehicles in a display of eager efficiency that I had never before seen in a primarily human group. I was wedged between Janice and M'Ress. The Catian, in a manner more canine than feline, stuck her head out the window and Janice turned around to talk to Giotto, who was crammed with the food supplies in the far back of the hovercar.

I was notably uncomfortable and therefore thankful that the trip took only seventeen minutes.

I had visited L'Psuh and the outpost of the Vulcan Science Academy before, so the area was familiar to me, but I still had difficulty containing my awe. Every time I saw the mile-long crescent of land known as First Beach, I had to pause to absorb the stark aesthetic appeal of it. The water was a wild dark grey, even in the sun, capped with pale foam, and it threw itself onto the shore as if possessed with a demonic will to conquer. Large rocks rose from the harbor waters, their sides worn smooth. Only a thin border of alabaster sand lay at the tide's edge: The rest of the beach was composed of millions of stones that appeared uniformly dull from a distance, but were in actuality pale shades of the rainbow. Driftwood trees, looking like enormous bones, were strewn around the area.

The landscape was so different from Vulcan, so different from even the forested areas around Sporks, that I had to pause to assimilate the new view into my mind. The only objects that were not so striking in appearance (to myself, that is – my companions seemed just as enthralled with it as I was with the beach) were the Academy buildings in the distance. Their architecture was of Vulcan origin and they dominated the skyline with soaring baroque spires.

We traipsed down the beach, Christine leading the way to a ring of smaller driftwood logs. A fire circle, filled with black ash, was already in place and wood was quickly found for it. Gary Mitchell arranged broken branches in a conic shape, and then lit them with an antique lighter. The flame was blue and red and green and flickered in the wind before truly catching and blazing up. We sat on the logs around the fire, enjoying a moment of serenity.

"It's colorful!" Janice exclaimed in surprise.

"The sea salt does that," Zarabeth explained to her. "It gets soaked into the wood and then burns prettily."

I noticed something odd in the fire. "Fascinating. I expected the blue and green hues, but I did not foresee the appearance of the scarlet sparks." People turned to regard me quizzically. I was about to explain my remark when another voice spoke up:

"Most of Earth's water doesn't have too much lithium in it, but the VSA does some weird testing shit and doesn't see a problem in dumping the relatively harmless chemicals in the sea. Most of them get carried this way in the currents. Sorry I'm late, by the way."

Jim Kirk was standing behind me, golden hair tousled in the wind, grinning down at the group. I was not sure if I was pleased with his arrival or not. I considered him a friend and found his company to be mostly positive. However, I knew that he was not allowed in this area, and by not alerting the staff of the Academy to his presence, I was committing an infraction of Academy rules.

I decided that I would remain silent so long as Jim behaved properly.

After thirty-one minutes of idle chatter, Giotto expressed an interest in exploring the nearby tidal pools. It was a diversion I was grateful for: most of the females in the group were practicing the Terran ritual of gossip, and Janice and Gary had been flirting with Jim, who was amused but not interested.

I do not know why Gary's and Janice's actions bothered me, nor why I felt an odd twinge of emotion when I imagined what it would be like if Jim were interested. I could not identify the emotion, though its physical symptoms were highly odd (a tightening in my heart and a roiling sensation in my intestines), and that bothered me just as much as the fact that I was feeling something when I shouldn't have been.

Seven of us ended up hiking over to the tidal pools. Gary stayed behind, claiming that the last time he visited he almost drowned in a shallow pool and acquired acute post-traumatic stress-disorder. Jim and I walked together, despite Janice's obvious displeasure and her best attempts to get between him and me.

After a short time, Jim pulled me away from the group and we walked along the beach. We were silent. In most circumstances I would have enjoyed such calmness, but I was aware with some hidden sense of Janice's eyes drilling into the back of my head as we moved away from her. It was disconcerting.

When we neared the area where the fire was, we saw that the group that had remained there increased in quantity. It was obvious by their straight black hair and pale skin that the new arrivals were Vulcans.

"Uh-oh," Jim muttered, stepping behind me. "Time for me to make myself very discreet."

"That seems an unnatural state for you to be in."

"Yup," he affirmed. "…Aren't you going to ask me why I don't want to be seen?"

"I already know that you have been restricted from Academy grounds. I would inquire as to what lead to such a restriction, but I doubt you would answer me."

"Damn straight I wouldn't."

An unfamiliar figure stood up from the ring around the fire and approached us. The person was not Vulcan, but I did not recognize them from the group that I came with. I told Jim and he quickly peeked over my shoulder.

"Don't worry," he whispered in my ear, cool breath ghosting over the sensitive tip and sending a shiver through my spine, "Bones is a friend."

The person – Bones – drew closer and I could see that he was a Terran male, about twenty-four or twenty-five years old. His face was arranged in a scowl I suspected to be habitual, but his bright blue eyes were more amused than annoyed. "Jim! What the hell are you doing here, kid?" I could not place the accent in his voice, but I found it pleasing to the ear even if his next words were offensive: "And who is this green-blooded elf?"

Jim laughed softly to avoid attracting the attention of the Vulcans around the fire. "Bones, this is Spock. He goes to school with me and already knows I'm not supposed to be here. Spock, this is Leonard McCoy – he's some sort of genius with medicine and got a scholarship to come study here. I call him Bones because he keeps this model skeleton in his room." The man, Bones, and I looked at each other, measuring each other visually.

"I must say, Jimmy," he drawled, "You sure have a habit of picking up the odd ones."

"Excuse me?" I asked stiffly while Jim snickered.

"You heard me. A Vulcan going to Sporks High? Sure the place is a good school, but I woulda thought you'd be going here. 'Specially with the way T'Pau and T'Pring talk about you. And put that dammed eyebrow of yours down."

Just as I opened my mouth to speak, Jim broke in: "Hey, Bones."

"What, kid?"

"Well, first stop calling me a kid-"

"You are a kid."

"No I'm not!"

"You're younger than me. And I'll stop calling you kid when you grow up _and_ when you stop calling me Bones."

"It's a great nickname."

"No, it's-"

"Whatever. The other thing I needed to tell you is that I think I need to go now."

And with that he ran off the beach, back towards the tidal pools, and I noticed a Vulcan heading our way.


End file.
